White Hat, Black Hat
by Fluffy-CSI
Summary: Part 24 up! The four detectives are put on a case involving two dead hackers and a missing computer virus. GorenEames and LoganBarek, WIP. Sequel to Spilled Blood and Sacrifice.
1. The facts

A/N: Ok, I admit it, I'm a complete and utter feedback whore, and so many people said they wanted another fluff/casefile storythat I decided to go ahead and jump right into a new one. No guarantees about how it'll turn out; I'm just hoping the plot will come together sometime before the story ends!

A/N 2: Oops, made a minor change today (1-24) to fix a continuity error.

* * *

It was twelve thirty on a Tuesday and Logan and Goren were huddled over Goren's desk, each holding a sandwich in one hand and a highlighter in the other as they scanned a set of phone records they'd volunteered to work on for one of the other detectives.

Boredom was the enemy when it came to Major Case's best and brightest, and since neither partnership had been hit with a full-blown case in nearly a week, they'd gotten sick of sitting around. Well, it was really more like Eames and Barek getting sick of having Logan's spitballs land on their desks, and everyone getting sick of Goren's restless pacing, but it all amounted to the same thing. Today, they'd finally given up hope.

Eames and Barek, after a few minutes of quiet discussion, had gotten to their feet halfway through the morning and mumbled something about female bonding, making Logan and Goren look at each other blankly. "You'll think of something to do, boys," Barek had said sweetly, patting her partner on the head. "Don't start any fights with each other while we're gone, mmkay?" With that, they'd disappeared, leaving their partners to occupy themselves however they could, which turned out to be by volunteering to check a set of phone dumps for one of the other detectives who was running behind.

"Uh, guys," Deakins said, approaching the two men from behind now as they worked over the phone dumps.

Logan jumped slightly, startled at the breaking of the silence that had reigned for the past hour. Half the lettuce in his sandwich slid out of his loosened grip, landing with a plop just inches from Eames's laptop. "Hell," he muttered, suppressing a less work-appropriate word and quickly grabbing the escaped food, hoping Goren wouldn't mention it to Eames. "What do you want, Captain?"

"Nice to see you boys, too," Deakins replied dryly, raising his eyebrows at Logan's actions. "I've got work for you both. Where are your partners?"

Logan looked blank and shrugged; Goren thought for a second and said, "Probably on the firing range."

"Firing range?" Logan echoed. "How'd you get that out of 'female bonding'?"

"Eames is too professional to sneak out to watch a chick flick in the middle of the work day," Goren said as if it was a given, garnering laughs from the other men. "Eliminate that and an ice cream run, and there aren't too many other things they can bond over."

"You've got a point there," Deakins agreed. "One of you want to call down there and get them?"

Logan wiped the mayonnaise off his hand with a napkin and nodded. "Yeah, sure. I'll do it."

"Good. Let me know when they're back." With that, Deakins headed back to his office, knowing he didn't need to push the detectives to get moving. Eames and Barek would hightail it upstairs at the thought of a possible case.

"Use your phone?" Logan asked Goren, nodding at the desk phone that sat next to his portfolio.

Goren just nodded and waved a hand toward it, then returned his attention to his lunch.

Logan rolled his eyes and dialed the extension for the firing range that occupied the basement of the building.

"Yeah, you got Bullet 'R' Us," said the attending officer who answered the range phone. "What do you want?"

Logan took a moment to wonder why he hadn't taken a job that let him be rude to callers. "Detectives Barek and Eames should be down by you," he told the man when he decided it was because firing range supervisors were almost _required_ to be grimy while on the job. "Get me Barek."

A few seconds later, Barek's voice came over the line. "Logan?"

"How'd you know it was me?"

She snorted. "The guy said the caller didn't have any manners, so I knew it wasn't Goren. I played the odds after that."

"Very funny. Now, grab Alex and haul ass up here, would you, because I think we might have caught a real, live case."

"Hallelujah!" she exclaimed, then cut off abruptly. "Oops. The whole room just heard that and now Eames is laughing at me. We'll see you in a few minutes."

Logan hung up the phone and raised his sandwich toward his mouth, but didn't manage to actually take a bite before Goren lazed back in his chair, crossed his arms, and asked, "You always talk to your partner like that?"

"Shove it," Logan grumbled, resolutely stuffing half of the sandwich remains in his hand into his mouth.

"Hey, just asking," Goren said, holding up his hands in mock-surrender. "Because she doesn't strike me as the type to -"

"I thought I told you to shut up."

"If you say so." Goren flipped open his portfolio and promptly became absorbed in something inside it, appearing to forget that the other man was near his desk at all.

Barek and Eames, both slight winded from their run up the stairs, jogged up to his desk a few minutes later. They'd expected to find their partners bouncing around like impatient little boys, but what they found was that each man was scowling and pointedly concentrating on something that wasn't near the other man.

"Well?" Eames prompted, taking in the two sulking men and waiting for them to announce the details of the new case. When neither answered, she turned to Barek and sighed pointedly. "So much for 'don't start any fights'."

"Yeah, really." She swatted Logan on the shoulder to get his attention. "You guys are pathetic, you know that? You can't even eat lunch without bitching at each other!"

"Goren, Eames, Logan, Barek!" Deakins called from the doorway of his office. "In here, now!"

The four obediently trooped into the captain's office, and a quick game of musical chairs ensued as Barek and Goren claimed the two chairs, Eames sat herself on the corner of Deakins's desk, and Logan was left standing in the middle of the room with a frown. After a second, he shrugged and moved to stand behind Barek's chair.

"You know," Deakins said when everyone was settled, "you guys get good results when I put you together, but it's a damn pain in the ass to yell all your names in a row. Not to mention the chair situation."

"I hear if you put in a requisition now," Eames spoke up with a grin, "you can have a new chair in here by next Christmas."

"Yeah, just what I always wanted," he muttered darkly, re-capping his pen and dropping it on his desk.

"Chairs not on the top of your list?" Logan asked with a grin. "Who knew?"

"Very funny, Detective."

"I try."

Barek twisted around to glare at him. "Maybe you should stop trying quite so hard."

Deakins stood up and cleared his throat pointedly, regaining everyone's wandering attention. "Can we get to work now?" When scattered nods answered his question, he nodded in satisfaction and sat down again. "Like I told Logan and Goren, I've got a case for you."

"Uh, sir," Eames said, shifting her weight in her chair nervously, "why don't you sound too happy about that?"

"Because it means I've got to give up all four of you again, and that leaves me in a bind when the _next _case comes in," he said with a sigh. "Not to mention that I'm getting sick of all the fighting you guys do."

"We'll behave," Barek assured him, turning and giving her partner a look that promised retribution if he didn't.

"Does getting called in together mean we're working together again?" Eames said, looking around at the three other detectives. "I mean, not that I have anything against working with Logan and Barek again, but . . ."

"Two victims," Deakins replied with a sigh that indicated he wasn't too big a fan of the circumstances surrounding this case. "Actually, it's more like two crimes."

"Two crimes?" Logan echoed, wondering if he'd heard wrong. "But only one case?"

"Yes. And that's why I need all four of you on this, two and two." With that, Deakins slid a manila folder across his desk to Barek. "You guys get the murder of one Aaron Weiss."

She opened the folder and held it so that both she and Logan could read the pertinent information on the first page. "This happened almost a week ago? Why are we only getting it now?"

"Because," Deakins replied, handing a second folder to Eames, "up until today, he was just another dead kid."

"So . . . what happened between then and now?" asked Logan.

"Jeremy Carter happened, apparently," Eames said, eyes still on the open folder in her hands. "Twenty-two years old, killed yesterday. What's the connection, Captain?"

Deakins just leaned back in his chair and gave the four detectives a chance to finish looking over the contents of the files. "They were both known associates of the Net Kings," he said when all eyes were on him again. "Some kind of 'cyber gang.'" He said the phrase tentatively, as if he couldn't quite believe something so unusual was coming out of his mouth.

"You're kidding me, right?" Logan burst out. "What's a 'cyber gang,' a pack of geeks with sharpened slide rules?"

"You know, I think I've heard of them," Barek spoke up, ignoring him. "They're still up-and-comers, but they're suspected of being the source of some of the nastier worms and viruses that have gone around lately."

"Eraser and AntiSocial come to mind," Eames said, nodding. "They modeled themselves after the Masters of Deception, but with a lot less ethics."

All three men in the room looked at her blankly, while Barek just smiled and shook her head. "You're good, Eames."

"Why, thank you," Eames replied with a grin. "You're not so bad yourself."

"Ok, ok, so we've established you're both smarter than the rest of us put together," Logan grumbled. "Now can we get the details of the case?"

"Aaron Weiss was found dead in his apartment five days ago," Deakins supplied, glad to be back on track. "Gunshot wound to the back of the head, no obvious signs of a struggle. He's been at the bottom of the list for autopsy, since he wasn't a pressing case, so we don't have anything from there yet."

"Looks like we get to go harass the M.E.," Barek said with a grin.

Logan sighed. "Oh, that's just great. I can't _stand_ the smell down there."

"Wuss."

"Jeremy Carter," Deakins went on, pointedly speaking over their joking, "was killed last night, also in his own apartment. He was strangled; it looked like it was done by hand, but I'm still waiting to hear from forensics about whether they got any prints off the skin."

"And these are considered one case now . . . just because the victims knew each other?" Eames said dubiously.

"According to a high-class snitch I keep on hand," he replied, "there's a rumor on the street that one or both of them had created a new computer virus and were preparing to deploy it. So far, no trace of it has turned up in the computers Tech impounded, though. The scenes haven't been thoroughly searched, but as of now, there's no disk labeled 'Hello, my name is Virus' lying around in plain view in either guy's apartment."

Goren, who had been observing silently, nodded now and said, "And you think . . . whoever killed them was after the . . . the, uh . . ."

"Source code, would be my guess," Eames supplied. "The program itself's useless without that."

"Uh, right," he said, giving her a slightly confused smile. "The source code. You think someone killed Aaron for the source code, couldn't find it, went to try Jeremy and either got it from him or killed him when he couldn't find it? Is the program worth enough to justify something like that?"

"It's a _virus_, Bobby," Eames said with a sigh, kicking him lightly in the shin to express her exasperation. "You can't exactly market a destructive worm - or at least, if you can, I don't know how - so it doesn't have any monetary value, except maybe to another hacker who wants credit for writing it."

"Why would you want to take credit for writing a virus?" Logan asked blankly. "You'd be arrested the second it hit the news."

Barek and Eames looked at each other, silently acknowledging that their partners were way behind them in terms of computer knowledge. "I think maybe we should go spend the rest of the day doing some, uh . . . foundation work," Barek said, glancing pointedly at the men. "You know, get ourselves up to speed."

"Sounds like a plan," Eames said, sliding off the desk onto her feet. "Not much else we can get started on." Heading for the door, she added, "Guys? You coming?"

"Right behind you," Barek said. "I'm herding them, don't worry."

Barek, the last one out, closed the office door behind her and thenturned to the other three. "I think we need an emergency hacking tutorial."

"I think you're right," Eames agreed after stealing a quick look at her partner, who, she was thankful to see, didn't seem to be insulted by the idea. "Dinner? Where should we do it? I'll bring my laptop."

"Yeah, dinner." Barek looked up at Logan, smiled brightly, and then looked back to Eames. "Mike volunteered his apartment."

"I . . . what?" Logan yelped. "No I didn't!"

"You did now," she told him with a smirk. "You just didn't hear yourself say it; you must have been talking real quietly. You know me and Eames have already done it once each; now it's someone else's turn. Besides, your place is a mess; it's not like we're going to break anything that's not already broken."

"His apartment's a mess?" Eames asked casually, raising her eyebrows. "You know this . . . how?"

"Oh, bite me. You've been in Goren's place a million times, I'm sure, even before -"

"This conversation is over," Goren said firmly before Barek could finish her sentence. "You guys just let us know where and when, when you figure it out." With that, he took Eames's arm and, ignoring her protests about wanting to finish the conversation, began to drag her back toward her desk.

"Spoilsport," Barek teased over her shoulder as she turned and followed her partner back to their desks.


	2. Turnabout

A/N: The usernames and names of forums and other such potentially identifiable stuff are all made up. Just so no one gets the urge to stalk one of my characters, or take up hax0ring ;)

* * *

"Uh . . . what's with the partner swapping?" Deakins asked later that day, coming to an abrupt halt as his eyes fell on Eames's desk, where she sat with her computer, and then Goren's desk, where Barek was busily typing on her own laptop. "Yet another fight?"

"Here, I found something," Eames said to Barek, appearing oblivious to Deakins as she gestured to her computer screen. "From the Hax Forums: 'N.K. claims they'll have it by the end of the year, but they brag better than they code. Anyone know who's the lead programmer this time around?'" she read. Then, turning her head to look at her boss, whom she had been fully aware of since he appeared next to her, she explained, "We're sniffing around programming forums and other places online where people might know about the mystery virus. So far, there's been lots of questions and no answers."

"Not really surprising," Barek said with a shrug. "It's generally not a good policy to tell people all about your evil plan before you even finish it."

"Mmm, true. Did you ask about something else, Captain?"

"Your partners. Or rather, your lack of them. This morning, I found Logan at your desk," he said, gesturing to the chair she was occuping, "and now Barek's at Goren's desk. What gives?"

"This morning, Eames and I were down on the firing range. Right now, well . . . our partners are computer illiterate when it comes to stuff like viruses," Barek informed him without looking up from her computer. "So we sent them to go pull the victims' records while we do some research."

Deakins nodded, then sighed, looking resigned. "If you guys are going to keep switching desks, maybe you should start wearing nametags."

Now Barek looked up, giving him an offended look. "You sayin' I look like Goren, Captain?"

"Uh, no." He paused, trying to think of the right way to continue this conversation but coming up blank, and after a moment, he went for the old standby: "Well, I just stopped by to check in. I'll be in my office if you guys need me."

Both detectives nodded a goodbye and returned their eyes to their computers.

"So," Eames murmured to Barek without looking up a few minutes later, "speaking of partners . . ."

Barek hammered at the _backspace _key and focused her eyes on the screen in front of her. "Don't even think about it."

"Oh, come on. You totally looked like you had something to tell me when we were downstairs. It's been what, a week since me and Bobby watched you have that fight? _Something _has to have happened between then and now!"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Barek said determinedly, deliberately making herself sound vague and disinterested. "Oh, hey, we need to remember to get these guys' emails, screen names, all that stuff. That's where all the good information's going to be."

"Don't change the subject," Alex shot back. "Let's start easy: what time did he go home that night?"

Knowing her friend couldn't see her face over the laptop screen, Barek indulged herself in a smirk before she said casually, "Who says he went home?"

Alex choked on the cough drop she'd just put in her mouth. When she finally managed to get her breath back, she glared at the other woman. "For real, or are you just playing with your mind?"

Logan, who overheard her last words as he and Goren approached the women, put a hand on Eames's shoulder when he reached her and gave her a friendly leer. "Oh, come on, Alex. Personally, I can think of some better parts of you to play with than your mind."

She spared him a bored glance, then turned back to her Google search. "And that's why you're not the one who gets to play with _any _of my parts."

"Not even your toes?" he teased, sitting on the edge of her desk and handing her and Barek each a stapled packet of photocopies. "Aaron Weiss's records."

"Just for that," Alex informed him tartly, "you will be staying _far_ away from my feet for the foreseeable future."

"Fingers?"

"No."

"Arms?"

"No."

"Uhh . . . neck?"

"No," she said again, "but I think if you keep on with this line of questioning, you're going to get a foot up your ass, and it's not going to be mine."

"Huh?"

"Although," she added, looking thoughtful, "I can't be sure which of them will get to you first, so you run a 50/50 chance of it only being a size seven instead of a thirteen."

Logan, who had been continuing the questions mainly for the entertainment value of her snarky responses, looked up and found his partner glaring daggers at him. As soon as he caught her eyes and opened his mouth to say something, though, she looked away and moved her attention down to the records he'd just handed her, appearing to become engrossed in them. "Uh, Carolyn?" he attempted, wondering what the hell was going through her head.

Her response was to mutter a cool, "You're an idiot," without raising her head.

With a sigh, he turned to glance at Goren, hoping to get a commiserating look, if not some commiserating words, from the man who had become an uneasy ally in the past few weeks. What he actually got when he turned, though, was a look dangerous enough to inspire him to mumble something about having been kidding around and move - quickly - off Eames's desk. Ally or not, he realized a second later, he should have remembered that Goren had no problem throwing a punch or two at someone who gave Eames too much attention

Alex watched this with a smirk. "Told you so," she said sweetly, when Logan turned his eyes back on her. "Want a hint?" she added with a grin. When he nodded warily, she looked pointedly at Barek, and then back to him. "She likes Lindt truffles and Merlot."

Logan may have been dense, but he wasn't entirely stupid. He immediately made a mental note to pick up wine and chocolate on the way home tonight. Maybe he could convince his partner to hang around to sample them for a while once they sent Goren and Eames home after dinner.

* * *

Barek was withholding all non-essential conversation from her partner by the time they stood up from their desks at five o'clock. Pretending she was oblivious to his presence, she strolled over to Eames, who was still hunched over one last form. "Hey."

Alex didn't respond until a second later, when Barek tapped her on the shoulder. She looked up, blinking. "Oh, uh, hi. Sorry . . . I was zoned out. What's up?"

"I just wanted to check - can you guys get to dinner by six, or should we push it back to seven? And can you find Logan's apartment?"

She gave the questions a few seconds of thought. "I don't think either of us has to stop at home first, so six should be ok, as long as it's ok if we might be a couple minutes late. And yeah, we can find it."

"Neither of you has to go 'home,' huh?" Barek echoed with a grin. "When are you two going to give in and just consolidate?"

Alex snorted. "Yeah, and then _you _can be the one to explain to Deakins why our personnel files suddenly have the same address." She paused, shaking her head with amusement, then sobered slightly. "Carolyn . . . are you mad over what happened earlier? With Logan?"

"Ugh," she groaned. "I was hoping if I pretended those five minutes didn't exist, I could forget about them. No, I'm not mad - at least, not at you."

"At Mike?"

"Wouldn't you be?" Barek pointed out.

"Good point. But I just, you know, wanted to make sure you know there's never been anything between me and him, and he's well aware of that. He was just playing around today."

She sighed heavily. "I know. It's not like he has a chance with you even if he does decide to chase you - not with Goren around. I just wish he'd be a little more . . . considerate."

Rolling her eyes at that, Alex stood up and closed her laptop. "Carolyn, you're dating Mike Logan - or almost dating him, whatever," she added before Barek could protest, "so you might as well resign yourself to the fact that 'considerate' is not in his everyday vocabulary. You're going to have to beat it into him."

That got a small smile out of Barek. "Beatings, I can do. Look . . ." She glanced over her shoulder, noticing that Logan was pretending to not be watching her. "I have to go grab him before he splits. I'm going to try to get this hashed out before you and Goren show up."

"I'll be sure to bring my Mace, just in case you're not quite done when we get there."

"Don't tempt me," Barek said over her shoulder as she turned to walk back to her desk.

* * *

"Thought you weren't talking to me," Logan said coolly when he noticed that his partner was standing next to his desk, waiting, a few minutes later.

"I'm not," Barek said, fully aware of how much she was contradicting herself as she crossed her arms defensively.

"Ok, so then . . . why are you standing here waiting for me?"

"Someone's got to make your apartment look inhabitable before Goren and Eames get there, and I really doubt that_ you_ were planning on going home and doing it," she snapped. "Who knows, if you leave things like they are, Eames might end up getting eaten by your six-foot pyramid of beer cans - and we wouldn't want _that _to happen, now, would we?"

Logan's expression changed from confusion to vague amusement. "Ah, so this is about that, huh?" he asked her, unable to keep the smugness out of his voice.

"I don't know what 'that' you're talking about," she said haughtily. "I'm just trying to explain to you that most humans, even the ones with dogs that look like wolves, don't live in _dens_."

"I don't live in a goddamn den, Carolyn!" he retorted in a near-yell. "Just because I don't have little lace doilies all over everything and a little ankle-biting dog doesn't mean that -"

"I don't care what you're planning on doing with doilies," Deakins interrupted loudly, having followed the sounds of shouting to their source, "but you're not going to do it in this squad room. It's quitting time, so get out, both of you!"

Both detectives clamped their mouths shut until he had nodded and walked away again. When she was sure Deakins was out of earshot, Barek said in a furious whisper, "You're a freaking idiot. As if Deakins wasn't suspicious of us enough already?"

He gave her a pointedly blank look, picked up his coat, and said in a chilly voice, "What's there to be suspicious of?" And with that, he turned and left her standing at his desk as he made for the elevators.

* * *

Goren and Eames were barely into the lobby of Logan's building before the sounds of a fight somewhere in the building hit their ears. "Geez," Alex muttered, trying to tune out the bumps, thumps, and shouts as they stepped into the elevator, "I thought his building was classier than this."

Bobby nodded. "Yeah, well I would have thought he wouldn't tolerate a domestic-waiting-to-happen living next door," he said a minute larer as they exited the elevator and realized that the yelling was coming from Logan's floor. "Guess we were both wrong. I think his place is to the left."

There was silence then, at least for a few seconds, and they both breathed a sigh of relief. "Yeah, guess -" Alex began as they stopped in front of Logan's door.

She broke off abruptly and instinctively jumped back as something that sounded like lightweight metal - a beer can? - hit the inside of the door and bounced off. Another round of muffled yells followed the impact.

The two detectives looked at each other. "That was _them_?" Alex said incredulously. "Damn, when she said she wanted to hash it out with him, I didn't think she meant she wanted to _make _hash out of him!"

Goren sighed and raised his hand to knock on the door. The sounds abruptly stopped, then started up again as a series of much quieter rustles and thuds. Just before the door swung open in front of them, he looked down at Eames and said, "I don't ever want to hear another word from you about _my_ temper."

"Yeah, yeah. Point taken," she grumbled as the deadbolt began to turn.

The door opened and they saw a flash of Barek's dark hair before she disappeared again, replaced by a gray-furred apparition that began to bark at them. "No!" Barek yelled at the thing, her flushed face becoming visible again as she leaned forward to grab the dog's collar. "Hi, guys. Sorry. Mike, control your damn dog!"

"Ben!" Logan called sharply from somewhere inside the apartment.

To everyone's surprise and relief, the dog immediately ceased barking, turned, and trotted past Barek to find his owner.

"Sorry," she said again, opening the door wider now that she didn't need to worry about the dog getting out. "He only listens to Mi- what?" she broke off, taking in the wide eyes and wary stances of the pair in front of her. "What's wrong?"

Alex took a cautious step into the apartment, expecting to see devastation and maybe a dead body or two. To her surprise, what she found was a large living room that was cluttered with books, papers, and ties, but otherwise clean. There was no blood, and everything breakable appeared to be intact; the only thing that seemed odd was a two-foot high trapezoid of what looked like beer cans and a large trash can sitting next to the doorway she was standing in. "Uh . . ." she managed, turning back toward her friend, "you, uh, helped him clean?"

His curiosity piqued at that comment, Bobby finally entered the apartment and moved to stand next to his partner. He, too, attempted not to look shocked. Tearing his eyes away from the scene of the non-crime, he turned to look at the only person who could currently explain their surroundings.

Barek's face was flushed and although she had her hair mostly pulled back, her hairline showed signs of sweat. She was wearing what looked like a men's crew neck undershirt above the slacks she'd worn to work that day, and she was barefoot.

Goren continued to stare blankly.

"What?" Barek repeated, more emphatically this time. "What are you staring at? You've never seen a girl wear a men's shirt?"

Alex suddenly felt the pieces click together in her head. Obviously there had been no fight, since Barek appeared more confused than anything else. The trapezoid of beer cans, paired with the trash can, suggested that there had been an impromptu beer basketball match. And the blouse Barek had worn to work this morning . . . "How many buttons did he pop off?" she asked her friend with a grin.

"He . . . what?" Barek looked down at herself, then back up to give Eames a sheepish smile. "Oh. Uh, most of them. Are you guys gonna come in, or are you just going to keep staring at me?"

"I don't know," Alex said slowly. "The whole 'staring at you' thing is getting to be quite amusing." Deciding to take pity on the other woman, she added, "We, uh, heard a lot of screaming and banging coming from in here. Thought maybe you'd finally snapped and killed him."

"Killed me?" Logan spoke up, working on fastening the last button of his shirt as he walked toward them from a hallway, the dog on his heels. "Why is she killing me this time?"

Barek smirked. "Because you've been abusing me, apparently."

"Excuse me?" he blurted, staring at her.

"They heard us, uh . . . yelling," she told him with a quiet cough.

Alex made a show of taking in Logan's untucked shirt and rumpled pants, then snorted. "Apparently it's a _really_ good thing we didn't get here five minutes later than we did."

"You thought I was _hitting_ her?" Logan persisted incredulously, managing to ignore her last jibe. "Alex!"

Goren chose that moment to finally speak up, asking Logan pointedly, "Insulting, isn't it, to have someone you work with decide that you're beating your partner?"

Logan acknowledged that truth with an unconcerned shrug. "Yeah, well, I'm already in hot water with the boss for beating _your _partner, remember? I've got my hands full."

"Sorry, Mike," Alex said, patting his shoulder as she walked past him. "You're right, I should have known better. But," she added, "in my own defense, may I point out that you two weren't speaking to each other when Bobby and I left work today?"

"Oh, that," Logan said casually. "That's been . . . resolved."

"Yeah," she said, looking with a smirk from Logan to Barek, "judging by what we heard, it sure has."

"Oh, shut up," Logan shot back, trying to re-tuck his shirt but only succeeding in making himself look awkward. "You guys here for dinner, or are you here to make fun of me?"

"Tough choice," Alex said after looking thoughtful for a few seconds, "but I guess we'll settle for dinner."


	3. History Lesson

A/N: Well, the last chapter had almost no plot and this chapter has almost no fluff, so between the two of them, I guess they balance out. Oh, and if you're wondering, the (abbreviated) history of hacking Barek and Eames give is pretty much all true (to the best of my knowledge...I was never a hacker, just a groupie).

* * *

"Uh, Mike?" Eames asked an hour later, glancing down at the dog, who was watching her as if he fully expected her to share her dinner with him. "Exactly what kind of dog _is _Ben? And does he bite?"

Logan swallowed a bite of his chicken. "He's the kind I got for free - well, almost free - from the pound. And he only bites if you move too slow."

"Oh, that's reassuring." She pointedly inched a little closer to her partner, who was sitting beside her on the couch, and eyed the dog suspiciously.

"He hasn't bitten me yet," Barek reassured her after throwing Logan a disapproving look. "Actually, he's pretty good at taking food out of your hand without even touching you."

"Really?" She couldn't resist testing that, so she held out a fatty piece of chicken she'd set aside. "Here, Ben."

The dog's tail started wagging even faster than it had been, and she could have sworn he grinned at her just before he reached up and delicately took the chicken from her hand, touching only the meat with his teeth. "Hey, you're right. He's -"

"Please don't feed the animal," Logan interrupted, scowling at Barek for suggesting it. "Or we'll never get rid of him and tomorrow morning you'll be explaining to Deakins why you have paw prints all over your case file."

"Speaking of case files," Goren said, wordlessly trading his dinner plate for Eames's, "are we going to look at them, or not?"

"What's the hurry? You got a hot date tonight or something?" Alex teased.

He glowered at her. "Pardon me for wanting to actually work the case I'm assigned to instead of being turned into a glorified records clerk."

"I detect a wounded ego," Barek said with a smirk. "It's not Eames's fault that we finally found something you don't know all about."

"Hey," Logan protested, "give the guy a break. Some of us have better things to do than stare at a computer screen for eight hours a day."

"Like what?" Alex asked, looking pointedly around the apartment. "Certainly not organizing your life . . . or doing your paperwork . . . or taking out your trash, for that matter."

"I don't know who _you're _spending eight hours a day with," Barek told Logan, "but last time I checked, you and I spend just about the same amount of time at our desks. It's just that _you _spend the time doodling and throwing balls of paper at people."

"Ok, ok." Goren held up a hand to get everyone's attention as he said, "I'm sorry I brought it up. Let me try this again: Barek and Eames, would you two mind telling Logan and me what you found this afternoon?"

The two women exchanged a look and Barek shrugged. "Sure, since you asked so nicely. The Net Kings, like Deakins said, are a gang of hackers - mostly young males - who get their kicks from outwitting computer security systems."

"It used to be," Eames added, "back in the eighties, that the height of hacking was to beat the phone system and get free long distance."

Barek nodded. "But by the late eighties, early nineties, the phones were too easy. Computer systems had gotten more complex and it started to become cool to find back doors into mainframes, steal space on corporate servers, stuff like that."

"And it's about that time that we hit an important distinction among hackers," Eames finished. "Namely, that just like there are good witches and bad witches, there are good hackers and bad hackers. Good hackers are called 'white hats,' and they tend to do stuff like find back doors or security flaws in systems and then notify the sysadmin or programmer."

"You know those little 'security updates' Windows is always bugging you about?" Barek asked the men. When they both nodded, she turned up her palms as if to say _there you go_. "A lot of the time those are to fix the kind of vulnerabilities hackers will search for. White hat hackers would notify Microsoft that they found one; the bad guys, black hats, would tell their hacker buddies and see how many ways they could screw your system."

"Nowadays," Alex went on, "they're starting to - what?" she broke off when Logan raised a hand as if he were in school.

"Uh, yeah," he said after a quick glance at Goren seemed to reassure him that he was doing the right thing by interrupting. "Are we going to talk about the case any time tonight, or are we just going to get a history lesson?"

"Men," Barek sighed. "You have _no _patience, I swear!"

"If you'd just sit still and shut up, then maybe you'd find out," Eames told him. "Now, would you boys mind if we continue?" Two shrugs answered that, and she decided to assume those indicated a yes. "Now, as I was starting to say when Logan interrupted, nowadays, they're not stopping at just finding flaws; they're creating their own."

"In other words," Barek said with a nod, "viruses."

"A virus can be anything from an nuisance that just clogs up email servers to a destructive program that wipes your hard drive," Eames said. "Word on the street is that the Net Kings liked the real bad ones, the ones that wipe your data, but first email them your credit card information."

"Ah, now credit card fraud," Logan said happily. "That's something I can sink my teeth into."

"Not the point, sorry," Barek said. "And keep your biting fetish to yourself."

Eames let out a startled shriek of laughter, which she immediately tried to muffle by pressing her face into Goren's shoulder.

Logan, who was turning an unpleasant shade of red, looked like he couldn't decide which woman to glare at. "It was just an _observation_, Barek!"

"Yeah, yeah," Alex said with a wave of her hand. "You two are going to have to keep your 'observations' on hold 'til me and Bobby are out of here."

"Now," Barek said, resolving to forget the conversation of the past five seconds, "like we already knew, Aaron Weiss and Jeremy Carter were both known to be members of the Net Kings, as much as something like that can be said to have 'members.' _However . . ._ no one uses real names when they're talking about this stuff. Everyone's got a screen name or five, and although we managed to make at least a partial list of the aliases of members of the group, as of right now, we don't know which was Aaron's or Jeremy's. We were thinking . . . maybe you guys could help out with that? Anything jump out in their files?"

"Moms' birthdays, names of their cats . . .?" Eames suggested with a grin.

"Uh, nothing that jumped out at me and screamed, 'I am a nickname,'" Logan replied with a shrug. "Goren, you did the Carter kid; you find anything?"

"Uh . . ." Bobby hastily retrieved his portfolio from beside him and flipped to his notes from Jeremy Carter's file. "Twenty-two years old . . . busted twice as a minor and once as an adult, all for criminal trespass. Lives with a 'Ronald Carter,' probably the father."

"Somehow I doubt that anyone's going to use their father's name as an online identity," Alex said dryly. "Mike, did Weiss have a record, too?"

Logan casually leaned back, which just so happened to put his shoulder in contact with Barek's. "Weiss was a bad, bad geek. Twenty-six years old, multiple arrests for criminal trespass, a couple for theft, one for assault. Oh, and a really impressive one for a violation of Homeland Security's 'Cyber Security' statute, whatever that is. Assault and Cyber Security were dropped due to lack of evidence."

"I bet he was a badass as long as he was in front of a keyboard instead of real people," Eames said, shaking her head. "It's amazing how different a person's personality can be when they're online."

"What," Logan teased, "you mean like maybe you're not a snarky loudmouth on the net?"

"I'm the soul of consideration," she said calmly, refusing to rise to his bait. "Are _you_ saying you actually acquire manners online?"

"Snarky!" he exclaimed, pointing a finger at her. "Just like I said!"

"Barek," Alex sighed, "control him."

"Behave, Mike," Barek ordered dutifully, not really expecting him to obey.

"Hey," Logan protested, giving his partner a wounded look, "whose side are you on, anyway?"

Barek elbowed him in the stomach. "The side that doesn't end with her killing you, moron. Got a problem with that?"

He looked from her to Eames and back. "Uh, nope, no problem here. No problem at all."

"That's what I thought," Barek replied with an approving nod. "So, do you guys understand hacking a little better now?"

Both men, still looking slightly bewildered by the concept, nodded. "White hats, black hats, security flaws, worms, viruses," Logan recited. "Yep, all crystal clear. Couldn't be simpler."

"Look," Eames said with a sigh, "neither Carolyn nor I has ever really been part of hacker culture. Right now, we're only trying to explain the technicalities - the 'how' - to you; to really get a handle on the who and why, we're going to have to track down some of the screen names on our list."

"And how, exactly, do we go about doing that?" Logan challenged. "Considering they're all aliases and we don't have a damn clue where to find any of their owners?"

The two women looked at each other, each hoping the other had an idiot-proof explanation, but when neither had spoken after a few seconds, it was Goren who jumped into the conversation, saying, "Whatever we do, it's probably going to involve bringing Carver into it and getting subpoenas."

"Lots of them," Barek agreed. "For ISP records, website registration information, and so forth. That may or may not give us the information we need, but it will almost definitely piss off the people who can help us the most - the hackers."

"That's a safe bet," Eames said. "I guess 'information should be free' probably doesn't extend to _their _information." She opened her mouth to go on, then paused, realizing that her joke didn't seem to have penetrated either man's consciousness. "The other option we have," she went on a second later after deciding that some things were just a lost cause, "is to go in through the front door, by finding someone connected to that community who's willing to help us."

"Yeah, great idea and all," Logan said, sounding completely unexcited, "but where do you plan to find one of these 'hacker' guys who would actually be willing to speak to the cops about this stuff?"

"Oh, I don't know," Eames said airily. "How does 'on the ninth floor' strike you?"

"Ninth floor?" Logan echoed blankly. "Of our building?"

Goren knew exactly who his partner was referring to and he rubbed the back of his neck as he groaned, "Not again, Alex!"

She just grinned at him. "You should be flattered, Bobby. He's got good taste in men."

"_Who's_ got good taste in men?" Barek and Logan chorused. After throwing his partner a quick smile, Logan added, "And did you say it's a 'he'?"

She reached out to pat his arm comfortingly in response to his scowl of confusion. "Bobby's got an admirer in the tech department. Either of you know Dan Lowe?"

Logan shook his head, but Barek nodded slowly. "I think I've met him once or twice. Long hair, glasses . . .?"

"Yeah, that's him." Alex stole a look at her partner and tried valiantly not to smirk as she said, "We met him when we were on the Kim case, and as soon as Goren left the room, Dan asked if I knew whether my partner was single."

"Was he, at that point?" Barek asked curiously.

"No, but there was no way in hell I was going to let it be known. I just told him that he wasn't gay and I thought he had a girlfriend."

"Hah!" Logan smirked and pointed a laughing finger at Eames. "Better watch your back Eames, or he might steal your man out from under your nose."

"Oh, bite me," she said with a roll of her eyes. "I hooked him up with one of the crime scene guys, and they seem to have hit it off. But wait," she cut herself off, suddenly realizing how far off-topic they'd gotten, "Dan's love life isn't the point. The point is that he's pretty much a computer guru, and if anyone can give us an in on these guys, it's going to be him."

Barek nodded, looking dubious, but then said, "A guru is nice and all, but what makes you think he'd be involved in an illegal scene like hacking?"

"Ah, grasshopper," Eames said, mimicking the fake Asian accent used by hundreds of movie kung-fu masters, "you have much to learn. For where there is one geek, there are many, and where there are many geeks, there is IRC. And where there is IRC, there is social networking."

"Uh, right," Logan said flatly. "And translated into English, that means . . .?"

She grinned. "It means that I can almost promise you that Dan knows someone, who knows someone, who knows someone who's got information on the Net Kings. Or, to put it in terms you can understand, Logan: it means that tomorrow, we're going to go downstairs and play 'The 6 Degrees of Dan Lowe.'"


	4. A study in contrasts

A/N: Well, this whole alternating of fluff and plot seems to be working out ok, so here comes a new cycle. This chapter's pure fluff, next chapter should deal with when they get to work in the morning and start back on the case.

* * *

"Geez," Logan said as he shut the door behind Goren and Eames later that night. "I thought they were never going to leave!"

"Mike, it's nine o'clock," Barek pointed out from a few feet behind him. "It's not like they insisted on staying half the night. You've got plenty of time to do whatever it is you do at the end of the day."

He rested one hand on the closed door to support his weight and turned his head to look at her. " 'Whatever it is I do'? What's that supposed to mean?"

She lowered her eyebrows, wary of the sudden sharpness in his voice. "It's not supposed to mean anything. I was just saying -"

". . . that you're leaving now, too?" he finished for her. "And so I should just start doing 'whatever it is I do,' since you're going to be gone anyway?"

"What?" She walked closer and put a hand on his arm, trying to read his face as she went on, "I wasn't saying that I was leaving. I was just saying that, you know, it's not like you don't have time to get anything done before you go to bed." She paused as his expression changed yet again. "What's going on with you tonight? You're being even snappier than usual."

"I'm not being snappy." He pushed off from the door and walked past her to the couch, where he flopped down next to the dog, who whined in annoyance and tried to retrieve his tail from under his master's legs. "All I did was ask you a question."

"No," she corrected, "what you did was cut off what I was saying to put your own words in my mouth, and I don't appreciate it." She sat down on the arm of the couch and rested an elbow on his shoulder, putting her face only inches from his. "So, go on and tell me what's got you all pissed off. Get it off your chest."

"I'm not pissed off," he insisted, his attention focused on where she was touching him. "Really, Car, I'm not," he tried again when she just gave him a skeptical look.

"Then what's with the attitude? You were doing fine until Goren and Eames left, and then suddenly you were being nasty to me."

"It wasn't nastiness!" Even _he_ could tell he was starting to sound like a broken record. "I promise," he tried again, putting an arm around her waist and pulling her off the arm of the couch into his lap. "I'm not angry."

She sighed. "You don't usually snap at me unless you're angry. So why did you do it just now, if not because you're pissed?"

"You going to hang around for a while?" he asked casually, seeming to ignore her question. "I, uh . . . I bought some of that chocolate Eames said you like."

Barek looked at him with raised eyebrows. "You did? Why?"

"Well, because you like it," he said, looking uncomfortable with this line of questioning.

"Why, Mike," she said, making herself sound aghast, "are you trying to _bribe_ me to stay here now that they're gone?"

He looked thoughtful. "Would it work, if I was? I mean, I don't have any wine, but -"

Grinning, she slipped her arms around his neck and gave him a hug. "You could have just asked me, instead of almost biting my head off. I don't need to be bribed to spend time with you - at least, not most of the time. And you _know_ I'm never going to turn down an offer of chocolate."

"You'll hang around for a while?"

"Yeah, sure. I'll even help you clean up all these dishes and stuff. I gave my animals enough food and water to last the night."

Now it was Logan who was raising his eyebrows. "You did? Why?"

"Uh . . ." She cleared her throat, knowing she'd been caught out. "You know, in case the meeting ran late. Can't be too careful."

"Uh-huh, right," he teased, taking her chin in his hand and kissing her lightly. "Because we were really in danger of Goren and Eames refusing to leave, since of course they'd rather spend their free time here with us instead of in bed together."

"Shut up," she retorted, digging the knuckles of one fist into his chest. "I just believe in being prepared for all contingencies, ok?"

He grabbed her wrists, transferred both to his right hand, and pulled them up to demonstrate as he asked, "Even contingencies like me refusing to let you out of the apartment for the next eight hours?"

Not bothering to struggle, she just shrugged. "Depends on the incentive. I'm flexible."

"You are?" he asked, deliberately misunderstanding her words and looking intrigued.

She groaned at his bad joke and retrieved one hand to give his shoulder a push. "Don't you wish you knew."

"You bet your ass I wish I knew," he agreed, kissing her again and sliding his hand down to the portion of her anatomy in question.

"Logan!" she squeaked, jumping to her feet. "Behave yourself. We've got an apartment to clean, remember?"

"Hmm. As I recall, our earlier attempt to clean ended with me pulling your shirt off. I'm willing to give that another try," he said, giving her chest a playful leer. "Sure. Let's clean," he added, standing up. "But Carolyn?"

"What?"

"I'm still five up on you with the beer cans. Remember the bet we made on that?"

She snorted. "Don't get ahead of yourself, buddy. There's still twenty more cans to go. I hope _you're _ready to pay up when I win."

He grinned. "Yeah. Yeah, I'll have absolutely no problem paying _that _forfeit."

"Good," she said, giving him a predatory smile. "Let's play."

* * *

Alex rolled over, taking a large portion of the blankets with her, and mumbled, "Hey, Bobby?"

"Bobby's asleep. You should be too," he replied tiredly, not moving his head from the pillow.

She ignored that. "What's going on with Logan and Barek?"

Opening his eyes with a sigh, he pulled his share of the blankets out of her hands, then lay down on his back, putting his hands behind his head. "Why would I know anything more than you do about that?"

"Well, Barek won't tell me anything, and you and Logan spend a lot of time together lately . . ."

"Only because you and Barek insist on disappearing every time we turn our backs. He and I aren't exactly best friends. Or friends at all. Besides, I find it hard to believe that Barek won't tell you _anything_. She admitted the thing about her shirt tonight, didn't she?"

"Well, yeah, but that was an anomaly." She moved closer to him so she could rest her head on his chest. "All I get is bits and pieces like that. I thought maybe Logan had let something slip to you."

"No, he hasn't," he told her, running his fingers through her hair, "and if I asked, either he'd think I'd gone insane or he'd hit me."

"Not like that ever stopped you before," she retorted. "As I recall, you and he were quite happy to try to knock each other out two weeks ago."

"I prefer to keep the peace these days," he said, leaning forward to kiss her. "Happiness will do that to a guy."

"Oh, that was clichéd, Bobby!" she groaned teasingly, sliding up the bed until her head was level with his.

"Sorry." He wrapped his arm around her, holding her to his side, and sighed. "I can try to finagle it out of him, if you really want me to."

"You would?" she asked, perking up suddenly.

"As long as you let me do it my own way so I can sneak it out of him without him realizing it."

Alex grinned. "You, my dear," she said, pausing after each word to drop a kiss on his face, "are the best partner . . . well, no - the _best everything_, ever."

"Complimenting me now, huh? You must be desperate for the information." He kissed her temple one more time, then loosened his hold on her slightly. "Are you appeased now? Can I go back to sleep?"

She snorted. "Yes, you can go back to sleep, lazybones."

"Alex, it's three in the morning. Anyone who's got a brain in their head is either asleep or trying to sleep right now."

She yawned widely, then grinned at him. "Point taken." Snuggling down against him, she pulled his arm tighter around her. "G'night, Bobby."

"Night, Eames."


	5. Dan returns

There were two large cardboard boxes on Eames's desk and three on Barek's desk when the detectives arrived at work the next morning. Alex, who arrived first, promptly yanked open the nearest box, which led to an explosion of packing peanuts that erupted onto her, her desk, and her unsuspecting partner.

"Eames!" Goren said, giving her a dirty look as he tried to overcome the static cling of the peanuts and get them off his hand and sleeve. "Watch where you're flinging those things."

"Guess that means you don't want the bubble wrap either, huh?" she teased, dangling the sheet of plastic in front of him. "I'll just set it aside where you can't get to it . . ." A second later, the bubble wrap had disappeared into the bottom drawer of her desk and her head was disappearing into the top of the box as she dug for whatever it contained.

"What's -"

"Score!" she exclaimed in a muffled voice, her head still buried in the box. "I got a computer here. Bobby, open the other box and see what's in it." With that, she carefully lifted out the laptop that had been hiding underneath the piles of peanuts and bubble wrap. "This is perfect timing."

Bobby obediently opened the second box, although he couldn't muster quite as much enthusiasm as she had when he pulled off a sheet of bubble wrap and said, "Looks like another laptop. The kid had two? That seems a little . . . redundant."

"Shush." She waved a quelling hand at him as she flipped open the laptop she'd been holding. "Hah, the geek's calling card."

Goren looked up from the machine in his hands. "Should I be afraid to ask what, exactly, the 'geek's calling card' is?"

She grinned and turned the computer around so the keyboard was facing him. "Crumbs in the keyboard, and the letters rubbed off of half the keys from being used so much. So I think it's a safe bet that these are Jeremy Carter's. I wonder if Logan and Barek got Weiss's . . ."

As if on cue, a shout of "Eames!" drifted across the room. She looked up toward the source of the voice and found Barek standing at her own desk, happily waving a sheet of bubble wrap in Eames's direction.

"We got two laptops and a desktop," Barek said as she jogged over to the other woman's desk to avoid having to shout her observations. "How about you?"

"Two laptops," Eames answered, waving a hand toward the machines on her desk. "Are yours all Aaron Weiss's?"

"Looks that way, yeah. Where did these kids even have space to _put _two or three computers? I'm lucky if I can find a clear surface in my apartment to put my purse down on."

"I hear it helps if all your flat surfaces aren't covered with sleeping animals," Alex said with a grin. "And when I say 'animals,' I'm including partners. What do you say we get these computers downstairs to Tech?" She swept up the laptop she'd just put down, then turned to look at her partner. "Bobby, get the other one?" she said distractedly. "Carolyn, I think we're going to need an extra -"

Barek burst out laughing before Eames got a chance to finish her sentence. "Sor - sorry," she managed through her laughter, gesturing helplessly to something behind Eames.

Alex turned around to see what was so funny and promptly matched her friend's laughter as she watched Mike Logan making his way across the squad room, trying to balance a laptop computer in one arm and brush a set of stubborn packing peanuts off his hair and shoulders with the other. "Aw, go help the poor guy, Car," she said, reaching for the computer Barek had been holding. "None of us are going to be able to walk if we're busy cracking up at your partner."

"This," Goren spoke up, leaning back in his chair and looking thoughtfully at the approaching man, "would be a very good moment to have a camera."

"You take a picture of this, I'll kill you," Logan growled, glaring at Goren as he stopped in front of his partner. "Help me out here, huh, Barek?"

Still snickering, Barek reached up and plucked one of the styrofoam bits off his shoulder. "Oh, you mean you want me to get rid of these?" she asked ingenuously. "But they're such an interesting fashion statement!"

"Barek, so help me . . ."

"Oh, alright. Lean down so I can reach," she ordered. A few seconds later, when she'd brushed away all the peanuts, she ruffled his hair teasingly. "Now _this_ is a sight I don't get to see every day."

"What?" he asked warily. "Me bowing down in front of you? Don't get used to it."

"Jerk," she said, giving his shoulder a push as she tried to ignore the snickers and giggles coming from Goren and Eames behind her. "I was referring to seeing the top of your head."

"The trick about that," Alex offered, leaning forward over Barek's shoulder, "is to just get him to spend a lot of time on his knees. Of course, it helps to give an incentive . . ."

Bobby cleared his throat pointedly and got to his feet. "You guys can discuss, uh, incentives some time when me and Logan aren't around. Right now, we've got five computers to handle."

"You're no fun," Eames teased him as she adjusted the two computers she was holding. "And here, take one of these. You're the big strong guy, you gotta do your part to help out your weaker partner."

"And that, ladies and gentleman," Logan said with a grin, "is the one and only time we'll ever hear Eames refer to herself as weak."

"Self-interest, my friend," she said, patting his shoulder as Goren oblingingly relieved her of one of the laptops. "Sometimes you just have to take a hit to get ahead."

"I'll keep that in mind," Logan said, smirking as he looked over his shoulder at his partner.

Barek rolled her eyes. "Yeah, well, another weak woman right here. Give me that laptop, and you can go get Weiss's desktop from off my desk."

"Gee, thanks." He relinquished the computer, giving her a look that told her he didn't buy her claim of weakness for a second.

"Any time."

Logan was back a minute later, trying to keep hold of the large cardboard box holding the CPU from Aaron Weiss's desktop computer. "Ok, let's get moving before I drop this thing on someone's foot."

"I'm ready if you are," Eames said with a grin. "Now, let's go see if we can all fit into one elevator while we're holding all this crap."

* * *

Dan Lowe was in the same position Alex always found him in: leaning back in his chair, feet on his desk and laptop balanced on his legs. He glanced over his shoulder and smiled as she entered, then returned his attention to the computer in front of him. "Hi, Alex. Had a feeling I'd be seeing you soon."

"Good thing you expected me," she replied, walking around and dumping the laptop in her arms onto his desk, "because I brought the rest of Major Case with me."

"Huh?" He closed the cover of his laptop and turned his chair around to find three more people in the doorway, all holding various types of computers. "Geez, a little warning would have been nice!"

Barek walked the rest of the way into the room, putting down her two laptops next to Alex's. "Sorry. We would have if we'd known these were coming today. Oh, and I don't know if you remember me, but I'm Carolyn Barek," she added, holding out her hand.

Dan shook her hand politely, but his attention remained on the two men still standing by the door. "You guys can come on in and put those down. Uh, if you can find somewhere to put them, that is." He hastily leaned forward and swept a set of pliers and roll of cable onto the floor to make room for the large box Logan was holding. "That should fit there. Detective Goren, you can put yours . . . uh . . ."

"Here," Alex said, picking up a stack of programming manuals off the corner of his desk. "This'll work. Don't you have a bookshelf, Dan?"

"Yeah, but it's too far away." He gestured to the bookshelf that stood against an outcropping opposite his desk. "Plus, it's full."

"One of these days you're going to lose your power cord or something in this mess and have a heart attack when you can't find it," she teased, moving to lean against the corner of his desk. "So, how busy are you today?"

Taking a pointed look at the computers that were now covering his desk, he sighed. "Too busy to do these, but I get the feeling I'm going to be doing them anyway. What do you need?"

"Well, you can feel free to delegate the actual work," Barek pointed out, looking around the room at the other desks and techs, all of whom were absorbed in various stages of computer autopsies. "Have you heard about the two dead hackers?"

Dan suddenly looked a lot more interested in what she had to say. "Yeah. These are from them? What am I looking for on them?"

"Supposedly," Logan spoke up, "they were writing some kind of new virus."

"Hmm. Yeah, the rest of the guys will want in on this." Dan paused, seeming to have just realized that he was speaking to a stranger. "I'm sorry, do I know you? Are you new?"

"I'm still trying to teach him manners," Barek said with a sigh as she pushed her partner forward to shake the tech's hand.

"Mike Logan," Logan supplied, obeying her unspoken order and shaking Dan's hand.

"Ohh. Hey, I've heard of you. You're the guy who took a swing at -"

"Yeah," Logan said shortly, cutting him off. "But that was a long time ago."

"Dan," Alex spoke up, taking pity on Logan, who was obviously displeased with having been identified by his past mistake, "the computers are important, but we also need to pick your brain."

"Yeah? On what?"

"Ever heard of the Net Kings?" Barek asked, raising her eyebrows questioningly.

"Yeah, sure. Hackers with a bad reputation and incredible coding skills. Why, are they involved in this?" he asked, suddenly not sure if he was quite so enthusiastic about this job.

"Both the dead boys were members," Eames explained. "The rumor was that they were heading up development of a new virus - or something like that - for the gang. Now they're dead, and the virus is nowhere to be found."

Dan shrugged. "Well, if it's on one of these machines, we'll get it."

"Yeah, we figured that," she said dismissively. "But we need to get an in on the group, too, and, well, they're not exactly coming forward and naming themselves . . ."

"I don't hack, Alex! Not like that, at least," he said, catching her drift.

"No, I know. But . . . you IRC, right? You've got friends all over?"

"Well, yeah," he admitted, looking pleased with himself at the realization. "Are you saying you want me to ask around?"

"Not openly," Barek said quickly. "Don't go posting it on message boards or anything. Just, you know . . . ask a few friends, see what they know, _who _they know . . ."

"If I do this for you," Dan said, poking Alex in the arm playfully, "you're going to owe me a hell of a lot more than just an introduction to some guy."

"No, Dan," she shot back with a theatrical sigh, "you can't have my partner, no matter how big a favor you do for me. Me and Carolyn will take you out to dinner or something, how's that? And besides," she added with a slight frown, "I thought you and Jack were doing good."

"Well, we are, but, you know . . ." He shrugged. "He's not the love of my life."

"Eh, loves of your life get annoying after a while," she said with a grin. "Always stealing the sheets at night . . ."

A throat was cleared loudly from behind her and she looked over her shoulder to grin at her partner, then looked back at Dan. "Look, why don't you see what you can come up with, from your friends and from these computers. Give me a call if you find anything good today, otherwise I'll check in tomorrow morning. Sound good?"

Dan sighed and smiled, eager for the challenge in spite of himself. "Sounds good."

"Ok, great. See you later."

He let her lead the rest of the group out the door before he shouted after her, "Hey, Alex - it better be an expensive-as-hell dinner!" He grinned when she responded by throwing an obscene gesture at him behind her back. "Hell, this is going to be an interesting week," he mumbled to himself. Then, tilting his head back, he shouted to the rest of the room, "Net Kings computers!"

All over the tech department, tools were dropped and laptops slammed shut as geeks stampeded toward Dan's desk.


	6. Nicholas Rutledge

"Ok," Alex said later that morning as she hung up the phone on her desk. "So, according to Jeremy Carter's parents, he was a code monkey at J.T. Brown."

"The huge financial services company?" Goren asked with mild surprise. "Big job for a guy so young."

"His mom said he was ecstatic to be there, working with the big boys." She absentmindedly straightened the stack of folders on her desk, then looked back up at him. "What do you say we go visiting?"

Bobby didn't need to speak his answer as he grinned and jumped to his feet.

* * *

"Hey, Car," Logan said at around the same time, hanging up his own phone and waving a hand to get his partner's attention.

Barek glanced up from the file she'd been scanning and murmured a disinterested, "What?" before returning her attention to the file.

"Geez, could you at least _pretend _to be interested when I get a lead?" he pretended to huff.

"Lead?" That caught her interest. The flie was shoved aside and she gave Logan her complete attention. "What kind of lead?"

"I got Aaron Weiss's place of employment. You ever heard of a company called 'Brinkerbat'?"

"Uh, no, can't say that I have. What is it?"

Logan smirked. "They make computer software . . . for the under-5 crowd. 'Make Happy Bunny eat all the apples,' and stuff like that."

"Doesn't exactly sound like the epicenter of hackerism," she said wryly. "But then again, I guess you never know what's hiding under that fuzzy pink bunny costume. You get their address?"

"Yes, ma'am." He handed her the message pad he'd written the information on, then dropped his feet from the desk back to the ground. "Want to go check them out? You got a niece who uses that kind of stuff, right?"

"Why Mike, I'm impressed," she said teasingly as they stood up and gathered their belongings. "I didn't know you even knew I had a niece in the first place."

"Yeah, well, even cops are google-able."

Barek snorted. "I'll just bet you googled me, and spent most of your time on the images section! Let's go, Sherlock."

* * *

"We simply can't believe something like this could happen to one of our employees," said David Holland, looking shocked at the concept even though it was at least the fourth time he'd professed his horror since Goren and Eames had met him ten minutes ago. Somehow managing to look like the antithesis of what a VP of Technology was expected to look like, the tall, gaunt man leaned forward and told Eames earnestly, "I mean, I'm sure you can understand that _all _our employees go through a rigorous due diligence process, and -"

"We . . . understand," Eames said, holding up a hand to cut off his spiel. "And we're very sorry for your loss. But right now, we're looking for Jeremy's immediate supervisor, not an overview of your hiring practices."

"Oh." Holland snapped his mouth shut, seeming surprised that this little wisp of a woman had cut him off and was taking charge. "Uh, sure. That would be . . . Nick. Nick Rutledge - he supervises Jeremy's group."

"Would you mind pointing us in his direction?" Goren asked, leaning a little closer to the other man and enjoying the experience of looking someone in the eye without having to crane his neck.

"Sure, sure. Uh, he should be in his office at this hour . . . if he's not, he's probably in one of the modular offices near it. Either way, it's to your left, down that hallway," he said, pointing to back up his statement. "Now, I need to get back to my desk. Of course, should you need anything else . . ."

"We'll call you," Eames said with a polite smile. "Thanks."

" 'Modular offices'?" Goren said under his breath as they started down the hallway.

"I believe that's corporate talk for 'cube farm,'" she replied with a grin. "Man, that guy was weird."

"Oh, you're just uneasy because he looked like a corpse."

She gave him an incredulous look. "Can you blame me? Cher would kill for those cheekbones!"

"I don't think Cher would be quite as comfortable in a Brooks Brothers suit, though," he pointed out as they walked into a large room that was subdivided as far as the eye could see by powder-blue partitions. "Think this is where we're going?"

"_Blue_?" Alex replied, shaking her head dazedly at the cubicle walls. "Someone's got to fire their interior designer. Oh, and yeah, I'd say this is probably it. See any non-cubicle offices that might be the supervisor's?"

Taking advantage of his height, Goren scanned the room for a few seconds, then pointed to the corner diagonally across from where they stood. "Looks like a corner office over there."

"Corner, huh?" she mused as they started to weave their way through the maze of cubicles. "He must have kissed upper-management ass to get one of those."

"Well, this _is_ Nicholas Rutledge's office. Play nice, Eames," he jokingly advised her as they approached the office and saw the nameplate next to the door.

She just rolled her eyes and murmured a noncommittal "hmm" before knocking on the doorframe and poking her head into the room. "Mr. Rutledge?" she asked the stout bald man who sat at the desk with his head bent over a sheaf of papers.

The man's head jerked up as if she'd startled him. "What? Yes, that's me. Can I help you?"

"Detectives Eames and Goren, sir. NYPD," she said, gesturing first to herself and then to her partner. "We'd like to ask you a few questions about one of the programmers you supervised - a Jeremy Carter?"

"Jer-Jeremy?" Rutledge stammered. "Why? Is something wrong?"

The detectives exchanged a look, both thinking the same thing: _No one told him_?

"Uh, sir," Goren finally said cautiously, "Jeremy's dead. We thought you would have been informed by now . . ."

Rutledge just gaped at him for a second. "Dead? He's . . . oh my god." Seeming to be embarrassed by his shock, he quickly looked away from his visitors. "What happened? Why are the police . . . did somebody _kill _him?"

"Mr. Rutledge," Eames said gently, moving closer to the desk, "we're very sorry for springing it on you like this. As my partner said, we thought you already knew. You look . . . upset. How well did you know Jeremy?"

Goren, deciding that his partner had the questioning well in hand, began a slow circuit of Rutledge's office, studying the diplomas on one wall - the man had an M.S. in computer science, apparently - and then the set of messily-colored coloring book pages that were tacked to another.

"He was very young, and I guess I kind of . . . took him under my wing. I had to go to bat for him to get him hired because of his lack of experience," Rutledge was telling Eames.

"Hmm. And why were you willing to go to bat for him?" she asked. "That is, did you have reason to believe that he was good enough to make up for his lack of experience?"

"I, uh . . . I saw some of his code. Jeremy was . . . well, he wrote programs in his spare time, as well as on the job, and a contact of mine forwarded me a sample of what he did."

"And it was that good?" Eames went on, trying not to turn her head as, out of the corner of her eye, she watched her partner pick up some kind of knicknack off a bookshelf, fumble it, and hastily return it to its place on the shelf.

"Jeremy was . . . one of the best I've ever worked with. Look, Miss," Rutledge broke off, sounding like he was steeling himself for something to come, "I have no problem answering your questions, but, well, please tell me what happened to him. Was he . . . murdered?"

"Shot," Goren announced casually, not putting down the picture frame he was examining. "In his apartment. This your family, sir? Cute kids."

Rutledge stared blankly at the detective's back for a few seconds as he tried to catch up to what he'd heard. "Uh, yes. My wife, Julia, my son, Samuel, and my daughter, Rebecca."

"Those are . . . biblical names. Are you Christian?" Goren replied, then quickly tacked on a weak laugh. "You don't have to answer that if you don't want to. I was just, uh, wondering."

Eames, who was working on figuring out what the Bible had to do with dead hackers, gave Rutledge a distracted smile when he looked to her for an explanation. "He's . . . eclectic."

Rutledge blinked, beginning to look extremely confused, and then managed, "Yes. Yes, I'm Christian. Does it matter?"

"Nope," Goren said blandly.

"Mr. Rutledge," Alex picked up, taking pity on the befuddled man, "do you know if Jeremy had any enemies? People who might have wanted to harm him?"

"I . . ." Rutledge paused, shaking his head as if he was trying to clear it. "I don't know anyone, anywhere who would consider sh-shooting someone unless they were in danger for their lives."

"What about your regular, garden-variety enemies?" Goren asked, reaching up to straighten the corner of one of the frames holding Rutledge's diplomas. "People who he beat out for jobs, that sort of thing."

"No." Rutledge shook his head. "No, no one like that. Jeremy . . . he was a nice kid. He got along with people."

_Yeah, that's what they all say, _Alex thought, suppressing the urge to sigh. "Did you ever have any problems with security that related to him? Unauthorized access to files, anything like that . . .?"

"Oh, no. Certainly not. He was actually helping develop a more effective security system for the company; he wouldn't try to break in unless he was just doing it to test the system."

Goren, appearing to lose interest in the diplomas, turned back to face the desk and the man behind it. "Who was he working with on that?"

The supervisor looked blank for a moment, then started digging through the papers scattered across his desk. "It was, uh . . . Security's baby. That is, we were lending Jeremy to Security for the project. Um, the supervisor there would be Al. Al, uh . . . Albert Brown. He's very good at what he does. The rest of the group is probably junior programmers and designers; you could get those names from him."

"I notice you called him 'Al,'" Eames remarked. "And you called Jeremy 'Jeremy.' Is this an informal company in general, or were you more friendly with them than with the average employee?"

Rutledge swallowed uneasily. "I guess you could say I'm friendly with Al. We're on the same supervisory tier, so we end up at a lot of the same things . . . meetings, beheadings," he joked with a weak smile. "Stuff like that. And Jeremy . . . well, like I said, he was young and I was a strong supporter of his."

"Ok," Eames said after glancing at her partner and receiving a slight shake of his head. "That about does it for now, but we may need to speak with you in the future. How about we exchange cards?" she suggested, holding out one of hers. She accepted the one Rutledge handed her and passed it to Goren for storage in his portfolio, then smiled at the supervisor. "Thank you for your help, Mr. Rutledge. Don't worry, we'll show ourselves out so you can get back to work."

"Uh . . . uh, thanks."

She looked over her shoulder just before she stepped out of sight of the doorway and was amused to find that Rutledge was fiddling awkwardly with his framed diplomas.


	7. George Thompson

A/N: Yes, yes, there is fluff coming, don't worry! Probably another chapter or two of plot, and then . . . girls night! Complete with wine, chick flicks, ice cream, and no men - or so the women think!

* * *

"I left my blouse at your apartment," Barek said casually as she parked the department SUV in front of the offices of Brinkerbat Software. "Is the dog going to eat it?"

Logan, who had just opened his door to get out, was so startled at the mention of her clothing that he nearly knocked his head on the door frame. "What?"

"My blouse, Mike. The one you ripped up, remember?"

She wanted to know if he _remembered_? Damn the woman, he would be able to forget it if he tried! "Uh, yeah, I remember. And no, the dog's not going to eat it. If he does, I'll buy you a new one or something."

She sighed and stole a glance at him as she murmured, "At least I remembered to take my bra home with me. I can afford to replace a blouse a lot more easily than a bra."

Logan cleared his throat and reminded himself that they were on the clock and jumping his partner at this moment would be frowned upon. "As much as I love discussing your bras, can we leave this topic for the ride back to the office?"

"Prude," she teased as he pulled open the door to Brinkerbat and held it for her. "Hey, thanks. You're learning." Giving him a pat on the arm and an approving smile, she walked through the door . . .

. . . and found herself surrounded by a sea of screaming children and beeping video games. As she stood just inside the door, trying to get her ears to adjust to the noise, two boys who looked to be about four or five caught sight of her and, still screeching, bolted for this interesting-looking newcomer. Barek, who had always prided herself on being able to handle her nieces and nephews at their most rambunctious, now found that she could only stare in horror at the approaching banshees.

"Whoa there." Logan, reacting quickly, shut the door behind him, bent down, and grabbed a child under each arm. "Where do you guys belong?" he asked them as he straightened up, lifting them off the ground.

Unsurprisingly, both boys magically lost the ability to speak now that they'd been caught. They simply stared up at him and squirmed around, trying to escape their human prison.

"Oh, no!" A harried-looking woman rushed up and relieved Logan of one of the boys. "I'm sorry . . . things are a little crazy around here today . . . Johnny, Steven, you two go back to your father and _stay there_, you hear me?" she ordered, depositing the child in her arms on the ground and gesturing for Logan to do the same with the boy he held. "I'm really sorry. It's testing day and, well, you can see what it's like. Can I help you guys?"

Both detectives were momentarily struck dumb by how little the room they were in resembled a software company. Logan, recovering first, gave the woman his most charming smile. "NYPD, ma'am. I'm Detective Logan, and this is Detective Barek; we'd like to speak with whoever supervised Aaron Weiss."

"Aaron?" the woman echoed. "Oh, isn't it horrible what happened to him? You're going to want to talk to George Thompson - he's the owner. Let me see if I can find him . . ." Rather than walking away to find the man, she simply rose on tiptoe, scanned the sea of heads filling the room, and shouted, "George! Visitors!"

Logan and Barek exchanged a look of amusement. "Reminds me of Sunday dinner when I was a kid," Barek murmured with a grin.

"Reminds _me_ of the squad room when you and Eames have had too much coffee," he replied dryly.

A few seconds later, a solidly-built middle aged man appeared in front of them. "I'm George Thompson. Can I help you two?"

"Yes," Barek said, giving him a wide smile. "We were told that you supervised Aaron Weiss?"

"Ohhh," the man said, understanding dawning in his voice. "This is about him . . . yes, of course. Let me take you in my office and get us out of all this screaming."

"Hallelujah," Logan muttered under his breath as they followed the man deeper into the room, and then into a private office.

"Sit, please," Thompson said, waving a hand to the chairs in front of his desk. "Aaron's dead?"

"Uh, yes, sir," Barek said, confused because she'd gotten the impression Thompson already knew the story. "He was murdered. We'd like to ask you a few questions about his work here, who he interacted with . . ."

"God." Thompson scrubbed a hand down his face. "I knew he was going to get himself truly screwed up one of these days. He . . . you have to understand, Aaron is - was - _very _good at what he does, but the problem was that he knew it."

"So he wasn't exactly Mr. Popular," Logan inferred. "Did he actually dislike other people, or was it just that other people disliked him?"

"Both. He had . . . I guess you could say a superiority complex. Truth be told, he did have a lot more talent than we were putting to use here having him do things like animating turtles. He stayed though . . . I always assumed it was because he just couldn't get another job."

Barek cocked her head to the side curiously. "Why wouldn't someone as talented as you say he was be able to find another job?"

"He had a . . . a record," Thompson said hesitantly, sounding unsure of himself as he attempted to tell the _police_ about his employee's _police_ record. "With the police, I mean. I think for fraud, or something like that. The big companies . . . they won't hire someone who's been convicted of . . . well, I guess of most things. I don't know exactly."

"Really," Logan murmured, stealing a glance at his partner. "So he was on the radar for the big companies?"

"Well, I assume so. I don't see why else he would have stayed here." Leaning forward as if he were about to impart some damning piece of information, Thompson added, "Aaron hated kids."

"In a place like this?" Barek asked, raising her eyebrows. "He must have been really unhappy, then."

"Well, it's not usually this bad. Testing days are when we bring the kids in . . . most other days this is just a normal office."

Logan crossed an ankle over his knee and leaned forward. "Do you know what Aaron did in his off hours, Mr. Thompson? Did he have any hobbies?"

"He . . . he programmed. That's the only thing I ever saw him do. I know he had . . . a group of friends. A club, or something. They would get together and see who could out-program each other."

"And how do you know about this club?" Barek looked around the room, then out the clear glass door. "Doesn't look like you would have a lot of time to chat over coffee in a place like this."

Thompson smiled. "Oh, I'd see him playing around sometimes when he didn't have anything else to do. I think he thought I was too out of practice to recognize what he was coding at a glance.

She grinned. "Kids today, huh? What was it that he was coding, if you don't mind my asking?"

"Oh, this was maybe a year or two ago, so I wouldn't swear to it, but I believe it was a password brute-forcer. Dictionary."

"Hmm." Barek nodded, then explained to her partner, "A program that tries to find out someone's password by trying one word after another from a dictionary until it hits the right one or runs out of options." She looked back at Thompson. "Why didn't you say something to him? You know a program like that's bad news."

Shifting his weight uneasily, Thompson shrugged. "You know, the kids today . . . they'll do something like that just to see if they can get it to work. He wasn't a _bad _kid, you have to understand. I just . . . figured he'd know better than to use it, especially after he'd already screwed up so many times with stuff like that."

"What's 'stuff like that'?" Logan jumped in, his attention caught by the man's last words. "I thought you said his arrest was for fraud."

"It was . . . computer fraud. Bank accounts."

"And yet you still thought he was a good guy?" Barek said incredulously. "You're a lot more forgiving than I would have been."

"Aaron was just . . . he was messed up, ok?" Thompson snapped, suddenly defensive at the skepticism in the detectives' voices. "He was an angry little boy with a lot of talent, and I thought it was better to give him something steady here than to kick him back out on his own and have him start doing whatever hacking he did in his free time, full-time. You're welcome to second-guess me if you want, but . . ." He shrugged. "I did what I thought was right."

"Ok, Mr. Thompson," Logan said, raising his hands in surrender. "You knew him better than us. But just tell us this, and then we'll leave you alone, at least for today: did you _like _Aaron Weiss? Or did you just feel obligated to keep him on, for all the reasons you just told us?"

Thompson looked taken aback at that question. "I . . . what? He . . ." He stopped, shaking his head. "Aaron could have been something good. Under the resentment and the . . . the depression, he wasn't a bad person. He just took the wrong path . . . and decided to keep on it even after he knew it was wrong. So yeah, I guess I did like him. I wish I could have helped him before he . . ." Swallowing, he looked away from the detectives. "Before he let it go this far."

"It sounds like you did everything you could, Mr. Thompson," Barek said gently as she stood up. "Don't let yourself feel guilty over not being a superhero." Turning toward the door, she paused and looked over her shoulder at Logan, who hadn't stood with her. He just smiled and waved her on.

Logan stayed sitting until Barek had walked out of the room, then slowly got to his feet and looked back at the man behind the desk. "She's right, you know. When you're that angry, that _stubborn_ . . . God himself can't help you unless you want to be helped. Believe me on that. Thanks for your time, sir." And with that, he gave Thompson a small salute, handed him a business card, and went to find his partner.


	8. Whining

"Let me get this straight," Deakins said that afternoon, dropping his pen and sighing in frustration. "We have one kid who was a saint and one kid who did his best to get on everyone's hit list . . . and somehow they _both_ got themselves killed?"

"Uh, yeah," Eames said after a second. "That about covers it."

"_Why_?"

"Believe me, if we knew we'd tell you," Logan sighed. "My best guess right now is that Aaron pissed off the wrong person and got himself killed, and the killer knew Jeremy could identify him.

". . . So he let Jeremy go on his merry way, then caught up with him five days later when he got bored?" Barek asked him, looking skeptical. "Somehow, I find that less than believable."

"Hey, _you _wanna take a guess?" he replied with raised eyebrows. "Didn't think so."

Goren cleared his throat pointedly, interrupting before the two could get into an argument and piss off Deakins. "Does anyone else find it a little odd that a kid barely out of college who's got a reputation for being . . . well, likeable, and security-conscious, would be spending his off hours making friends with a . . . a bitter hacker with a record who spends his free time at work planning how to commit his next crime?"

Silence answered that comment for a few seconds, and then Eames nodded. "He's got a point there, guys. How did someone like Jeremy Carter even get involved in the Net Kings, let alone get himself killed over it?"

"Through a friend?" Barek suggested. "Maybe he tagged along to a meeting, or whatever it is cyber gangs call it when they get together."

"Hmm," Deakins said, nodding thoughtfully. "That's a possibility, I suppose, although I get the feeling this isn't the type of club that issues visitors passes. Anyone got information on either guy's friends?"

All four detectives shook their heads. "We got a list of people Jeremy was working closely with on his current project at work," Eames said, "but that's the closest we got to 'friends'."

"Well, get on it and find their friends!"

"Sounds like _someone _could use a vacation," Logan said under his breath as he and Barek stood up.

"I heard that, Detective. Maybe you should try being concerned about your investigations, and then I wouldn't have to do it for you!" Deakins retorted. "Now, I want information on friends, guys. Hit the phones, talk to the parents, whatever. Barek's right that it's probably our best lead. Questions?"

Mildly surprised by his uncharacteristic abruptness, all four detectives shook their heads.

"Good. Then get out of here and start working!"

* * *

"Geez," Logan muttered as he settled down at his desk across from Barek a few minutes later. "Wonder what crawled up _his _ass and died."

"Mike!" she admonished with a startled laugh. "Cut the guy a little slack - he has to put up with you _and _Goren, day in and day out."

"Oh, and you and Eames are perfect?"

"Closer to it than you guys are," she said with a grin. "Must be all that wine and chocolate we consume."

Logan snorted. "Or the fact that you're both a hell of a lot prettier than me and Goren."

"I'm going to ignore the implication that we use our looks to get ahead, and take what you just said as a compliment," she said, giving him a sweet smile, "but I suggest you don't let Alex hear you say it. If she doesn't get you, Goren will."

He shook his head and gave her a smug smile. "Nah. Goren and me . . . let's just say we've reached an understanding."

"I'm afraid to ask." Leaning back in her chair, she gave him a smirk. "But I guess it's a good thing you've worked things out, because you two are stuck with just each other for tonight."

"I . . . huh?" he broke off as he processed her words. "Why would I be hanging out with Goren tonight, on my own or otherwise?"

"Well, you don't _have _to. Me and Eames just figured that since we're going to be busy, you guys would want to do some male bonding, or bitching, or whatever. Have a sleepover, do each other's hair . . ."

"You're going to be busy?" he echoed after managing to convince himself to not respond to her gibes. "With what?"

"Oh, the usual," she said airily. "Chocolate, wine, chick flicks . . . commiserating about how fat we are, maybe hitting on the teenage pizza delivery boy . . ."

He blinked. "You're having a . . . a girls' night in the middle of a case? Carolyn, you can't . . . we have interviews to go over, you two can't just take the night off!"

"Oh, you'll be fine on your own. And technically, work has no claim on us after five, so we can and we are. We need a break from dealing with you knuckleheads."

Logan stared at her, trying to gather his thoughts. "But I . . . what about your blouse?"

It took her a second to figure out what her blouse had to do with her taking the night off. "What about it?" she asked when she realized that he was saying she wouldn't get her blouse back tonight if she didn't see him tonight. Leaning forward and lowering her voice, she told him, "It'll still be there tomorrow, unless you decide to become a drag queen overnight. If that happens, you're _so _buying me a new one, just on general principle."

Logan opened his mouth to respond to that comment, but then decided against it as he looked up and saw Eames approaching.

"You trying to catch flies in there?" Alex teased as she sidled up to his desk, reaching out to push his hanging jaw closed. Then, turning to his partner, she grinned. "Is this his reaction to hearing about tonight?"

"Yeah," Barek answered, fingering her pen and watching with amusement as Logan tried to get his feet back under him. "I don't think he really believed there was such thing as a real, live girls' night until right now. He's _terribly _worried that we'll get behind on work by taking an evening for ourselves."

"I'm not 'worried,'" he protested. "I was being logical and telling you how inefficient it would be. And I knew girls' nights existed; I just . . . didn't think you two were the type to actually do it."

"Mike, you're looking at two women who spent a morning bonding over target practice," Alex said with a grin. "We take our girl-time where we can get it, and tonight's one of the times we can get it. Did Carolyn suggest to you that you do something with Bobby?"

"Yeah, I did," Barek supplied. "He looked, uh, dubious, to say the least. Although he claims that they've reached an 'understanding,' whatever that means."

Alex grinned. "It probably means they agreed not to try to break each other's faces unless one of them hits on the other's partner."

"It has nothing to do with hitting on our partners, Eames. And it's not _my _fault that Goren and I don't get along," Logan shot back.

"Yeah, yeah," Alex said, rolling her eyes. "It's all my fault, I know. I'm just such a _femme fatal_ that men are driven to fight over me. Yup, that must be it. However," she added, switching back to a more serious tone as Logan started to say something, "it's not like I'm an issue between you guys any more, so why don't you just bury the hatchet completely?"

"Workin' on it," Logan muttered. "You might try telling _him _that, instead of riding _me_ about it."

She gave him a bright smile. "Trust me, Bobby knows better than to pick a fight with you anymore. He knows he'd have to deal with me afterward, and I'm pretty sure he values, uh, certain body parts too much to risk it."

"Have I mentioned in the past few days that I _really _like your management style, Eames?" Barek said cheerfully as she watched her partner not-so-subtly cross his legs.

* * *

"You won't even let me come home with you for a little while?" Goren asked at five o'clock that afternoon, giving his partner a wounded look as she stood up at her desk and pulled on her coat. "You can't be starting your girls' night _that _early! And besides, we . . . we took my car to work this morning."

"Bobby, dear . . ." she replied with teasing sweetness, "whining doesn't become you. It's _one _night out of your entire life. I think you can live without me for that long. And I'll be just fine taking the subway, it'll keep me from downing a couple beers with Barek and then deciding I'm still good to drive home."

Still frowning, he grabbed his coat and followed her toward the elevators. "Well . . . what are you and she going to _do _tonight, anyway? You're really just going to eat chocolate and get drunk?"

"You're a man; you're incapable of comprehending the beauty of it." As they stepped into the elevator and watched the doors close in front of them, she took his arm, giving him an impertinent grin. "And look at it this way - even if I get blitzed, you won't have to carry me home or hold my hair back while I get sick. Think of it as a break from your duties as my partner."

He leaned down to steal a quick kiss before the elevator stopped on the ground floor, then released her arm and said, "You're not really going to get that drunk, are you?"

"Nah. Being utterly wasted isn't too much fun for me, either. Stop worrying, ok? We'll probably split a bottle of wine or something and that'll be it." She paused, then grinned and added, "And hey, if we go and do something stupid, you know no one's going to have the balls to arrest two Major Case detectives, no matter how much my neighbors complain."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

She shrugged. "No, not really, but it sure amuses _me_. Bobby," she said with a sigh, "we're just going to veg, ok? Cry over a sappy movie . . . stuff we wouldn't do in a million years in front of you and Logan. Nothing illegal, nothing dangerous, I promise."

"But -"

"And I'm not taking you home with me right now because I'm only going to be there for as long as it takes to change and throw some clothes into an overnight bag in case I decide to stay over. I mean, you're welcome to hang out at my place if you want, it's just that I won't be there hanging out with you." Patting his hand comfortingly, she cocked her head to the side and gave him her best attempt at a semi-serious look. "You'll survive a night without me, Goren, I promise. You did it for five years straight. So stop making me feel guilty and just tell me to have fun with Barek!"

"Have fun with Barek," Bobby dutifully repeated. "And . . . you know you can call me if you need me."

She just looked at him for a second, then grabbed his hand and pulled him into an alcove next to the building doors, so they were partially concealed by a wall. Quickly rising up on her toes, she took his face in her hands and kissed him, then pulled back a few inches and whispered,. "Love you. I'll probably call you sometime tonight just to see how you're doing."

Before he could respond to that, she was gone, heading for the subway station a few blocks away with a grin on her face.


	9. Preparations

A/N: And girls' night begins! This'll probably end up lasting a couple of chapters of fluff before I get some more plot squeezed in...but then, I'm never sure until I write it

* * *

"Yo, Goren!"

Bobby, who had been about to follow his partner our of the building, turned to find Mike Logan jogging across the lobby toward him. "What?"

Logan, who had half-expected to be ignored, pulled to an abrupt halt a few feet in front of the other man. "Er . . . uh, you headed somewhere?"

"You mean other than home? No. Why?"

Scratching the side of his chin awkwardly, Logan shrugged. "Well, you know. The girls are busy, and they said we should keep busy for ourselves . . ."

"And how do you propose we keep ourselves busy?" Bobby asked cautiously. He wasn't necessarily averse to socializing with the other man, but from what he knew about Logan, he wasn't sure their ideas of an entertaining evening would necessarily match.

"I'm guessing a strip club is out?" Logan said with a grin.

Goren snorted. "Are you kidding? If your partner didn't kill us, mine would."

"Well ok, you have a point there. Barek's pissed enough at me as it is."

"Oh?" Bobby asked mildly, remembering his promise to Alex to find out what was going on between Logan and his partner. "Why's she pissed at you this time?"

" 'This time'? What do you mean by that?" Logan said sharply, crossing his arms. "Never mind. Me and Barek get along fine," he went on before the other man could answer. "I stopped you to ask if you wanted to do something tonight, not to ask you for advice on how to handle women."

Raising his eyebrows, Bobby decided not to push his luck at the moment. "Yeah, well, if you promise you're not going to start a fight, sure we can do something. But like I said - no strip clubs."

"You up for a few games of pool?"

He was surprised that Logan had come up with something so close to normal as a second choice, considering how dangerous his first choice had been - at least, with regard to their future well-being with their partners. "Pool? Sure." He smirked. "Eames'll be mad she didn't get to join in - she's a hell of a pool shark. Where do you want to play?"

Five minutes later, they had agreed to meet at a pool hall midway between their apartments later that evening, and both men were heading home, trying not to wonder what their partners would be doing while the two of them knocked balls around a table.

* * *

"So," Barek said as she pulled open the freezer case in a grocery store near her apartment an hour later, "what did Goren have to say about tonight? Hmm, should we get 'cookies 'n' cream,' 'thin mint cookie,' or 'fudge brownie'?" As she said the name of each ice cream flavor, she pulled out a carton of it, and when she turned to Alex, she could barely see over the top of the stack in her arms.

"Thin mint _and _brownie," Eames replied, taking possession of those two cartons. "He had a minor crisis at the concept of having to spend a night on his own . . . then he started worrying about me drinking too much. I finally just said I'd call him at some point, and ran away before he could start worrying about something else. Do you have stuff to drink?"

"I've got whatever beer is left over from the last time you and I drank at my place . . . which, I think, amounts to all of two bottles. We should definitely pick up some wine or something while we're here."

Alex grinned. "I think between you and me, we can out-drink the boys. We'll have to try that one night." She paused, considering that. "On second thought, I'm not sure I want to be anywhere near a drunk Logan, for _his _own safety."

Barek snickered. "God, that would be a frightening experience. I can't think of anything he'd do that _wouldn't _piss off one of the other three of us."

"Booze aisle," Alex said, making a sharp right into the aisle lined with bottles of wine and liquor. "I bet he'd be really malleable, though - at least, for you. Just think of the things you could get him to do . . ."

Rolling her eyes, Barek waved a hand dismissively, saying, "He'd probably only be interested in fighting or sex. Or maybe both."

"Sounds like a ready-made pay-per-view event." She scanned the contents of the shelf in front of her. "Ooh, how about mudslide mix? Just add ice and a blender. You got a blender?"

"Pay-per-view?" Barek repeated incredulously. "Damn, you're more bloodthirsty than I thought! Well, we got two ice creams . . . why not get the mudslides _and _a bottle of wine? And yes, I have a blender."

"Mmm . . ." Alex agreed, nodding, as she grabbed the mudslide mix. When Barek turned back to her, holding a bottle of wine, she raised her eyebrows and grinned at the other woman. "Merlot? Does that mean Logan didn't get around to buying you any yesterday?"

"He bought the chocolate. I think the concept of wine was just a little too high-class for him."

"You're kidding - he really went out and found Lindt for you?"

Barek nodded. "It was kind of cute, actually. He was embarrassed aboout it. Should we get snacks, too?"

"Hey, that reminds me - we need popcorn to go with the movie," Alex exclaimed, trotting off toward the snack aisle with Barek trailing behind her. "He was embarrassed about it? Why? Like, because he did something nice for once in his life?"

"I don't think he's the type who's much good at, you know, gestures of affection. From his attitude, you would have thought he was kicking me out of the apartment, not offering me my favorite chocolate."

Eames giggled. "What's scary is that I can completely picture that scene. I hope you, uh, rewarded him appropriately for the gesture."

Barek gave her a thoughtful look, considering whether to answer the question or not, before finally saying, "I gave him some . . . positive reinforcement."

"Argh!" Alex made a show of throwing up her hands in frustration, almost clipping her friend in the chin with the box of popcorn she was holding. "You're _going _to tell me what's up with you two before the end of the night - even if I have to pour the wine down your throat to get you to do it."

"We'll see. Are we ready to check out?"

"Yeah, I'll pay for it." As she dug her money out of her pocket, she looked back at the other woman. "There's no 'we'll see' about it, Carolyn. I'll get it out of you. What movies did you get?"

"_G.I. Jane_ and _Ghost_. Those work for you?"

"A girl power story and a cry-your-eyes-out love story?" Alex grinned at Barek as she paid the cashier. "Sounds perfect to me."

"Yeah, I figured. Do you think they'll manage to keep themselves out of trouble for the night?"

"Who?" Alex asked distractedly as she accepted her change from the checkout girl. "Our partners? I don't know . . . I think it's a toss-up, depending on whether they get together or stay alone, and what they do if they do get together."

Barek grabbed the bag containing their groceries, then followed the other woman out of the store and down the street toward her apartment. "What do you think Bobby would want to do if they do something tonight?" she asked, adjusting the bag, which was starting to freeze the inside of her arm because of the ice cream it held. "I'm not sure if Logan knows of any entertainment besides pool that doesn't require females. And even that, he considers better _with_ 'em."

"Is he really that bad?" Alex said, glancing at her worriedly. "I mean, I know he cultivates the reputation, but . . . is it real?"

Sighing, Barek shrugged. "You know, I'm not really sure. As far as I can tell, he hasn't ever tried to play me -"

"Yeah, because he knows you're a better shot than him," Alex pointed out wryly.

"Maybe. Here, you take this," Barek replied, handing the other woman the bag and reaching in her pocket for her keys as they stopped in front of her building. "And maybe it's because he just hasn't gotten the chance yet; I don't know. But . . . it's kind of weird . . . when he's not paying attention, he's actually more . . . insecure than anything. Like last night when he was trying to tell me he did something sweet and bought chocolate for me, the only way he knew how to get it out was by being . . . well, rude."

"Aww." Alex gave her a teasing smile as headed down the hallway to her apartment. "You think he'd be interested to hear that you think he's so rude that he's cute?"

"Don't you dare!"

Eames just smirked.


	10. The girls

A/N: Ahem. Another day of avoiding the homework assignment from hell . . . another day taken up by trying to keep myself from ficcing. Another failure at that ;) Oh, and apologies for any typos . . . it's way past my bedtime and my eyes are crossing, but I stayed up to finish this so I didn't have an excuse not to do my homework come tomorrow.

* * *

"Here we go," Alex said, walking out of Barek's kitchen and into the living room. "Two more mudslides, made to order."

Carolyn grunted her thanks and accepted one of the glasses from her, then gestured toward the movie playing on the television. "Think we'd make it through that?"

"What?" She put down the drink she was still holding on the coffee table and dropped onto the couch, then looked at the TV. "SEAL training?"

"Yeah." Barek took a sip of her drink and made a pleased-sounding humming noise. "You make these so much better than I do. How is that possible when it only involves dumping half the bottle in the blender and adding ice?"

Alex smirked. "Probably has something to do with how much soberer than you I am. You almost ran into the wall the last time you went to refill the drinks."

Carolyn thought about that, then frowned. "You _are_ more sober than me. That's not fair! You've been drinking just as much, and I probably weigh more than you."

"You're just out of practice," Alex told her with exaggerated gravity, reaching over to give her a pat on the knee. "We'll start doing this more often and I'll get you into fighting shape. Then we'll challenge the guys to a drink-off."

"Speaking of challenging the guys," Barek replied, "I was serious - do you think we'd make it through SEAL training?"

"Hmm." She contemplated the scene playing on the screen in front of them, where Demi Moore was getting the living hell beat out of her. "Assuming we could physically stay alive through treatment like that? Hell yeah, we would. Me, I'd probably kill at least one of the jerks before I got through training, though. I think they frown on that, so maybe the Navy isn't my best choice for a career path."

Carolyn barely avoided snorting a sip of mudslide through her nose in response to that. "You know, when I picture that, I see Goren trailing along behind you, just waiting for you to let him get in on the revenge."

Alex grinned. "Oh yeah? What, you think Logan wouldn't actually go and push you aside do he could get to the guy? At least Bobby would ask first."

Stricking out her tongue, Barek rolled her eyes at the other woman. "Yeah, yeah, so my partner's got issues. At least he's getting a handle on them."

"He is?" Before Barek could answer that, Alex got to her feet. "I'm getting the ice cream out again. Which one do you want?"

"Yeah, he is. Him and Goren both are starting to get the hang of acting like human beings." She took another sip of her drink, then shrugged. "Grab me the brownie ice cream," she called after Alex, who was already on her way to the kitchen.

"True, he does seem to be losing his temper less," Alex called back, her voice muffled by the open freezer door. "You know anything about why that is?" she added, her voice innocent but her expression knowing, as she grabbed the ice cream and closed the freezer.

"What do you mean by that?"

Alex abruptly tossed the ice cream carton to her, grinning when Barek caught it handily. "Nice reflexes. And I didn't mean anything . . . except that you seem to mellow him out. Release some of his nervous energy, let's say."

"Mmm." Barek picked up the spoon she'd left on the coffee table when they put the ice cream away last, licked it clean of thin mint remnants, and pulled the lid off of the carton. "Don't think I don't know what you're implying."

"Oh?" Alex raised her eyebrows, brandishing her own spoon. "And what is it that I'm implying? Finish your drink."

"You're trying to get me to confirm or deny that me and Mike are . . ." She finished the sentence with a grunt and a shrug as she spooned a bite of ice cream into her mouth.

"Damn straight I am." Alex took a sip of her drink. "Can you blame me, after that show me and Bobby walked in on last night? What was that, coed naked beer pong?"

"We weren't naked!"

"Yeah, but only because we got there before he got all your clothes off you." Smirking, she added, "Did he apologize for ruining your blouse?"

Barek flushed and looked down at her drink, saying nothing.

"Why are you being so closed-mouth about this?" Alex prodded. "You afraid if you talk about it, it'll be real and you'll have to actually think about what it means for you guys?"

Carolyn downed the rest of her drink, scowling at the other woman over the rim of the glass. "Psychoanalysis, Alex? You're starting to sound like your partner."

"Yeah, well, my partner's usually right when it comes to stuff like that," Alex pointed out. "So answer the question."

Barek sighed. "Would _you_ answer a question for me, first?" she asked, speaking more quietly now, as she set down her now-empty glass.

Alex blinked, feeling a vague sense of alarm at the new hint of worry in her friend's voice. "Yeah, I guess. What?"

"Mike talks to you, right? I mean, I know I know you and he talk about you and Goren, so I figure you probably . . . you know, talk about stuff about him, too, right?"

"Well, yeah," Alex said slowly, "but we haven't been friends for very long. I don't know what I can tell you about him, if that's what you're about to ask." She paused, studying Barek's face, then stood. "I'm going to refill our drinks. You can ask me your question when I come back."

"Uh, ok." She sat in silence as Alex left the room, then accepted her drink equally silently when Alex returned.

"So?" Alex prompted when Carolyn continued to do her best impression of a deaf-mute. "What's your question?"

Barek took a fortifying sip of her mudslide, then returned the glass to the table, keeping her hands wrapped around it as though for reassurance. "Has he talked to you about, you know . . . women?"

"You mean like ex-girlfriends?" Alex asked warily. "I, uh . . . well, no." And he hadn't, not really. He'd let a few things slip here and there, and she'd heard the same rumors as everyone else, but she didn't know anything concrete. And the last thing she wanted to do tonight was share her inferences with Barek and then turn out to be wrong.

Barek, though drunk, had perfectly good hearing, and she didn't miss the uncertainty in the statement. "You don't sound sure of that."

Alex took a quick sip of her drink. "He really hasn't, Carolyn. All I have is the same impressions and rumors you've already heard."

"Well, has he talked about me?"

She considered for a moment telling Barek about how Bobby had agreed to pump the other man for information, but decided against it. "Not much. The thing is, ever since you and he . . . you know, became an interesting topic . . . I've hardly seen him without you or Bobby, or both of you, being there too."

"So you don't . . . he hasn't told you anything?"

Shaking her head, Alex reached for her drink again. "He hasn't said anything specific to me, but Carolyn . . . I know he likes you. He watches you at work. He blows off going out at night in favor of eating pizza with me and Bobby because it means you'll be there. That's a change for him, hon. A big one."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." She smiled at Barek. "Now it's your turn. What's up with you two?"

Carolyn toyed with her glass. "Nothing definite."

"Nothing definite?" Alex echoed with raised eyebrows. "You're tearing each other's clothes off whenever we leave you alone, and you say there's nothing _definite_?"

"We're not . . .!"

"Bull. Just _tell _me, Carolyn. You know I'm not going to spread rumors or anything. I just want to know where you guys are."

Barek sighed. "We haven't slept together, if that's what you're asking, but we're kind of . . . you know, moving in that direction."

"Uh-huh," Alex said thoughtfully. "And what does he have to say about that? For that matter, what do _you _have to say about that? Good, bad? Commitment, no commitment?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. I'm not the one-night-stand type, which I'm sure you already figured out, and I, you know, I _think _I like him, would like dating him."

"I detect a 'but' coming on."

"Mmm." Carolyn nodded and reached back to re-tie her ponytail, just to keep her hands busy so she didn't fidget. "Well, I mean, it's like you said. It seems really . . . un-Logan, the way he's acting. I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop, when I'll find out that I'm just a . . . a conquest and I've been taking this much too seriously."

"So he hasn't said anything that hinted either way? Nothing about you guys being an 'us' or anything?"

Barek ruminated on that for a few seconds before shrugging again. "How do you tell the difference between a partner's 'us' and a boyfriend's 'us,' when they're both the same person?"

Alex opened her mouth, then closed it again as she tried to think of an answer to that question. "I . . . you know, I don't have a clue how you do that. Maybe go by whether he's kissing you while he says it? Or not. You have a good point asking it, though, because I really have no idea. Does he even talk about things like 'What are you doing tomorrow night' or anything?"

"Did Goren?"

"Huh?" Alex managed, caught off guard by the turn-around. "Did Goren what?"

"Did he make it clear what he wanted, I mean?" Carolyn downed half of what remained of her mudslide, then wrinkled her nose at finding that it was mostly melted. "Did _he _talk about 'us' and stuff?"

Eames thought back a few weeks, trying to remember how she and Goren had gotten from being friendly partners to saying _I love you _to each other. "Well, it was kind of different with us. He . . . acted out, first."

"Acted out?" Barek echoed. "What does that mean?"

She smiled a little at the memory of their almost-romance mixed in with bloody work of the Andrew Kim case. "He started getting jealous of every man that came near me. But it wasn't 'til I threatened to put in for another partner that he actually opened his mouth and told me _why _he'd been acting like such an ass."

"Hmm. That's no good to me. If anything, Logan's being too nice, not being an ass. So what, Goren just came out and said, 'I want you to be more than my partner'?"

"Um, no, not quite. That came later. Actually, it was your partner's fault when he finally did."

Barek blinked. "_My _partner?"

"Yeah," Alex said with a grin. "Remember, I told you they got in a fight?" When the other woman nodded, she shrugged. "When Bobby punched him, I kicked Logan out and kept Goren in, and we had a knock-down-drag-out until he admitted that he was so afraid someone was going to steal me away because I'm the only one who 'fits' with him." She paused, then added, "And don't ever tell him I told you this, please. He'll either kill me or die of embarrassment."

Carolyn couldn't help but smile at the story, even as abbreviated as it was. "That's cute, Alex! At least Logan's good for _something_."

"Yeah, but we're not talking about what already he did for me; we're talking about what he _can_ do for you," Alex reminded her.

"I don't know. I'm afraid to push. What if I'm just taking this way too seriously and he's just having a little fun? Because if that's what it is, I'm not sure I want to know."

Alex sighed. "You've got me there. Hey," she added, noticing that the TV screen had gone dark, "movie's over. Want to start the other one?"

"Yeah," Barek said, brightening considerably. "I could use a good cry right about now. Tell you what: you go grab the thin mint and open the wine, and I'll go find us a box of tissues."

"Now _that_," Alex said as she stood up, "is my idea of a fun way to spend the rest of the night. Screw our partners, I want to drool over Patrick Swayze!"

Carolyn, who was on her feet and almost out of the room at that point, stopped and looked over her shoulder at the other woman. "You're weird, Eames. You know that?"

Alex just shrugged. "You have to be weird to get along with Goren."

"Yeah," Barek muttered, smothering a giggle, as she headed out of the room again. "And you have to be even weirder to sleep with him."

"I heard that!"


	11. The guys

"I don't know how you drink this shit," Bobby grumbled, grimacing as he put down his bottle of beer and reached for his pool cue. "The department can't be paying you _that _badly."

Logan snorted and stepped back from the table, resting his weight on his own cue. "Not everybody's a golden boy who's in high demand, Goren. I gotta take what they give me. Besides, Bud's not that bad a beer."

Bobby just rolled his eyes and took his shot, sending the cue ball into the three, which kissed the five and knocked it into the center pocket. "You're going to owe me your next year's paycheck soon at this rate."

"All ten dollars of it?" Logan said dryly. "You're welcome to it. I'll just move in with Barek and mooch off her."

Bobby straightened up and looked at the other man with raised eyebrows. "Does _she_ know about that? I don't know how you guys work, but Eames'd kill me if I tried to move in with her."

"I'm not serious, moron." Logan watched with a smirk as Bobby's next shot went wild. "And there's no way you're going to convince me," he added as he bent over to line up his shot, "that Alex wouldn't want you living with her. You guys are attached at the hip as it is."

Bobby waited until Logan dropped the nine into a corner pocket before shrugging. "Attached at the hip is one thing. Attached at the bathroom is another. Besides, we're talking about you and Barek, not me and Eames."

"Yeah, well, me and Barek aren't exactly equivalent to you lovebirds." Not looking up, he circled the table to set up his next shot. "Besides, like I said, I was kidding about moving in with Barek."

"Hmm." Bobby watched as Logan maneuvered into what was he seemed to think was the perfect position behind the cue ball, then held onto his comment another second longer until he'd cocked his arm back in preparation for his shot. "You and Barek sure look a lot like lovebirds lately," he finally announced just as Logan's arm began to move forward.

Startled by that statement, Logan jerked and his cue only glanced against the edge of the ball, sending it ricocheting off the walls of the table in a path that bore no resemblance to what he'd intended. "Fuck!" He raised his head and glared at Goren. "You did that on purpose!"

Bobby attempted to smother a grin, but only partially succeeded. "Take a look at the table, Logan," he replied, waving a hand toward the green felt. "I don't need to cheat to kick your ass."

"You -"

"Besides," Bobby continued, talking over the other man's protests, "it's true, what I said about you guys. Given that she was running around your apartment topless, I'd really rather assume that you guys _are _lovebirds than that you're not."

"She wasn't topless," Logan snapped, thumping the butt of his cue on the floor for emphasis.

Bobby didn't dignify that with a response immediately; instead, he just choked up on his own cue and, with little visible effort, set up and took a quick shot, sinking the seven. "What, your undershirt magically teleported itself onto her without her blouse coming off?"

Logan scowled at the back of Bobby's head as Bobby bent down to make his next shot. "You've got even less business than I do thinking about Barek with her shirt off."

Bobby glanced up at him, raised an eyebrow skeptically, then returned his eyes to the table. "You didn't answer my question," he pointed out as he watched the three come to rest against one wall of the table. "Your shot."

"Gee, thanks," Logan said sarcastically as he took Bobby's place at the edge of the table. "And if you want to talk about lovebirds, why don't we talk about you and Alex and your, uh . . . _interesting _relationship."

"Because I already know all about what's between Eames and me," Bobby pointed out with supreme logic. "Whereas you and Barek . . . intrigue me."

"Yeah, well, go you can go 'intrigue' _yourself_," he muttered, managing to make the nonsensical statement sound like an insult.

Bobby was quiet for a moment, allowing Logan to make his shot without disruption this time. "Ok, then," he said thoughtfully as he watched the ten drop. "If it's not romance, then it must have been a fight like I originally thought. Which makes the issue of how your shirt got on her even _more _interesting, to my way of thinking."

"Don't you ever shut up?" Logan growled, purposely leaving his cue stick in a position to collide with the other man as he crossed to the other side of the table.

"You've worked enough cases with me to know the answer to that."

"Yeah," Logan snorted, "unfortunately."

"So?" Bobby prompted, smirking as Logan once again missed his shot. Yep, he was getting the guy flustered. He just hoped it ended up with Logan spilling the story and not with Logan hitting him. Alex would be less than pleased if that happened. Resolving to be less confrontational, he picked up his beer again. "She certainly seems to like you."

"Yeah," Logan said with a snort, "she said it's because her cat likes me. How's that for feminine reasoning?"

"Somehow, I doubt it's only because of her cat. You know she and Eames talk, and -"

"What has she said?" Logan blurted out, interrupting him.

Bobby glanced up from the table to give the other man a smug look. "Well, you know how it is," he said carelessly, moving his attention back to his shot. "Girl stuff. Alex won't tell me much - not that I really expect her to - but she's given me the impression that Barek, for some godforsaken reason, likes you."

"Yeah?" Slightly appeased by Goren's admission, Logan propped his cue on the floor and lounged against it. "That's . . . interesting."

There was a lull in the conversation as Bobby made a shot that sent balls spinning all over the table and dropped the last two that were his. He watched them fall, then straightened up and grinned at the other man. "Eight-ball, middle-right. And 'interesting,'" he added as he lined up his final shot, "is not the word I would have expected you to use for that revelation. I don't know what the hell she sees in you if that's how you react to finding out a girl's interested in you."

"Oh, right," Logan scoffed, silently willing Goren to miss his shot. "Because you're Mr. Romance. Hell, _I _romanced Eames better than you did."

The eight ball bounced off the edge of the pocket and rolled back to the center of the table. "Bastard," Bobby snapped, glowering at Logan. "What, you call Chinese food and a lab report 'romance'?"

"You certainly seemed to think so at the time. Besides, how many times have _you _brought her chocolates?" Logan shot back as he lined up his shot.

"We're not talking about Eames, here," Bobby said, fighting the urge to jam the butt end of his cue into Logan's side. "So leave her out of it."

"Touchy, aren't we," Logan murmured, smoothly sinking the twelve. "Don't dish it out if you can't take it, Goren."

"Don't be so obvious when you try to change the subject, Logan," Bobby retorted.

Neither man said anything as Logan sank two more balls, bringing himself to the eight ball. "Maybe you're gonna be the one turning over his salary at the end of the night," Mike finally said smugly. "Eight in the corner pocket."

Bobby shrugged. "I'll buy you a drink if you win this one, how's that?"

"You're on." A second later, he watched the eight drop into the pocket he'd indicated, and grinned. "Ah, sweet victory! Now pay up, buddy."

* * *

One hour and three games later, the men were tied at three games each and the tension between them was decreasing rapidly with every drink one bought the other.

"You _suck_, man!" Logan crowed as he watched the cue ball bounce off the table and onto the floor in response to Goren's badly-aimed shot. "You're buyin' the next round!"

Bobby gave him a bored look. "There's still ten balls on the table, Logan. Don't count your chickens."

Logan just shrugged and returned his attention to the game.

A few minutes later, he drained the beer bottle in his hand and set down on a corner of the table with a solid _clunk_.

Startled by the unexpected noise, Bobby looked over at him. "What was that about?"

"Done with it," he grunted, walking around to the other side of the table to take his shot.

Bobby snorted. "Apparently _someone_ can't hold their liquor."

"Oh, like you're completely sober?"

"I didn't say I was sober. But you don't see me tossing around my empties. Then again, you seem to have a habit of doing that, if that pile of cans in your apartment is any indication." He was careful to leave out mention of Barek when he mentioned that night this time.

His restraint was rewarded a second later when Logan studied the table, seemed to decide it wasn't worth any more attention, and looked back up at Goren. "You think the girls are drinking tonight?"

"Unfortunately," Bobby said with a sigh. "I'm just hoping Alex doesn't go _too _wild. She's hell with a hangover."

"How do you even know this stuff?" Logan said with a shake of his head. "I mean, I know you've worked with her for a long time, but come on, it's getting a little ridiculous."

"What's getting ridiculous?' Bobby asked warily.

"All this shit you know about her! She's a pool shark, she's a sleepy drunk, she's hell with a hangover . . ." He shrugged. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you'd been, you know, 'involved' for years."

"I listen and I watch," Bobby said simply. "It's not that difficult to pick up on if you pay attention to her." He paused, frowned. "Which I recommend you _don't _do, if you want to keep yourself in one piece. Besides," he added with a shrug, "you and Barek spend a lot of time together. I bet you know stuff about her that you don't even know you know."

"Oh yeah?" Logan asked interestedly. "Like what?"

Downing the rest of his drink, he shrugged. "Why doesn't she ever wear skirts to work?"

"Excuse me?" Logan said sharply.

"Does she baby-talk to her pets?"

He blinked. "Does she . . . what?"

"What's the quickest way to piss her off?"

"I . . ." Logan snorted. "Flirting with Eames, judging by what happened the other day - and it also seems to work on you. But what the hell are you talking about, 'does she baby-talk to her pets'?"

Looking away, Bobby allowed himself a smirk that Logan couldn't see. "Well, a woman who baby-talks to animals tends to do it to men, too, at least at certain times. But that's not the point. I was giving you a list of things that you probably didn't even know you know about her."

"Barek doesn't baby-talk," he snapped, still hung up on that point.

"To her pets?" Bobby asked, picking up his empty bottle. "Or to you? I think we both need a refill."

Trailing after Goren as they headed for the bar, Logan frowned. "Neither one of those!"

"Hmm." He retrieved two new beers from the bartender and told the man to put it on his tab. "So then how do you know she's interested in you?" he asked, just to be provoking, as he turned back to Logan. "If she doesn't talk about it . . ."

"She said her cat likes me, remember?" Logan said, knowing full well how lame that statement was but trying to make it sound as un-lame as possible. "Besides, she's . . . I can just tell, ok?"

"Hmm," he said again. "You ever come out and tell her that you're really interested in her?"

"Hell no." Logan snatched one of the beers from Bobby's hand and took a defiant swig. "Why the hell would I set myself up like that?"

Not rising to the bait, Bobby took a more decorous sip of his own beer. "So you're telling me that you two are doing things that involve running around your apartment naked, and she doesn't even know whether you're using her or not?"

"Hey, fuck you," he snarled, offended at Bobby's implication. "She knows I'm not using her. What the hell would I use her for, anyway? If I just wanted to get laid, there's a whole city out there full of girls who would look at my badge and jump in the sack - and none of _them_ would spend most of their time picking fights with me."

"True," Bobby allowed. "But of course, that begs the question: if she's so much trouble, why _aren't _you out picking up easier women?"

Logan scowled and muttered something unintelligible in answer to that question.

"Say again?" Bobby asked, raising his eyebrows at the dark look on the other man's face.

"I said, 'Because her cat likes me'," he mumbled, a little more clearly this time but in an equally displeased tone of voice.

Caught by surprise at that, Bobby barely avoided spitting the sip of beer he'd just taken all over Logan and the pool table. "Because her cat likes you?" he repeated incredulously when he'd regained control of his breathing. "I'm starting to think you and the _cat_ have something going on, not you and Barek."

"Yeah, well, the cat doesn't have any objection to sitting on my lap and being petted," Logan retorted with a sardonic look. "Unlike some _people_."

"Getting shut out, huh?"

"That's none of your business!"

"Well, _you _brought it up," Goren pointed out. "I wouldn't have thought Barek was the type to withhold sex to get revenge. Always figured she'd be more likely to break your arm or something."

Damn, he was definitely inching past the borders of non-provoking conversation, he thought as soon as the words were out of his mouth. Maybe he should lighten up on the beer.

"She's not with-" He stopped to slam a palm against the wall next to him. "There's no sex to withhold, damn it!"

Bobby paused with his bottle halfway to his mouth and eyed Logan dubiously. "There's not?"

"No!"

"Why not?"

"Stop asking so many fucking questions," Logan growled.

Goren just shrugged. "I'll stop asking questions when you stop giving such intriguing answers to them. Why haven't you slept with her?"

"What, you threw Eames down on the bed as soon as you had your first date?" He snorted. "Because somehow, I don't think you did. You wouldn't have made it through the night alive."

"Well, no," Bobby admitted without thinking. "Actually, _she _dragged _me _to bed. And it took almost a week."

Logan stared at him. "Are you fucking nuts? I can't believe you just answered that question!" A smirk appeared on his face as he added, "Alex would kill you if she heard about this."

Bobby flushed and very deliberately set his beer down out of easy reach. "Forget I told you that," he ordered. "Now. Or else."

"Yeah, ok, Big Mouth," Logan scoffed.

With a sigh, Bobby crossed his arms and stared the other man down. "Well, now you've got your details about me and Eames, so you damn well better answer my questions about you and Barek."

"What questions?"

"Why aren't you sleeping with her?"

"Because you and your damn partner insist on being around every _damn_ time she's in a good mood!" Logan shot back, exasperated. "By the time I'm alone with her, either she's too tired or she's pissed at me." He paused, then added, "Besides, I don't want to fuck things up by pushing her."

Bobby's eyebrows made another trip toward his hairline. "Careful, there - you're sounding almost . . .'sensitive.' Might ruin your reputation."

"Screw my reputation," Logan muttered. "I'm just sayin' -"

Bobby didn't get to find out what it was that Logan was "just sayin'," because before Logan could finish the sentence, the phone on Bobby's belt began to ring. Muttering a curse, he reached for it and checked the caller ID, then blinked and looked up again. "It's Alex," he informed Logan. "I have a feeling this night is about to get even more interesting."


	12. The mix

A/N: This is another one of those chapters that's all extra-fluffy fluff and no plot. But hey, if you're into that kind of thing...

Notes: If you don't know how to play pool, there are a few things in here you need to know to understand what they're talking about. Not that I'm an expert or anything, but still. First, a "scratch" is when you knock the cue ball, which is the white ball that's not a ball that's in play, either into a pocket or off the table. Second, the game is ended by someone sinking the eight-ball.

* * *

Logan snorted and took another sip of his beer. " 'Interesting' . . . yeah, that's one way to describe tonight. So, go on and answer it."

Bobby just grinned and unfolded the phone. "Hey," he said to his caller, not bothering with a full greeting. "You guys having fun?"

He was answered by a loud burst of laughter made up of two distinct feminine voices. "Well," Alex said after a few seconds of auditory chaos, "we're both crying, if you consider that 'fun'."

"Crying?" Bobby blurted, alarmed.

"What?" Logan exclaimed from beside him, freezing with his beer halfway to his mouth. "Why are they crying?"

"I don't know!" Bobby snapped back "If you'd shut up so I can hear her, maybe we'd find out!"

In his ear, Alex snickered and called, "Hey, pay attention!"

"I'm listening. What's up?"

"Don't worry," she told him teasingly. "It's not bad crying. We just finished watching a sad movie. Speaking of which, have you ever thought about taking up pottery?" Both women broke into laughter again, not giving Bobby a chance to reply. "Don't answer that, Bobby. Barek says it wouldn't work for you." The was a pause, and then her voice sounded again, more muffled this time: "Stop laughing, Car! Yours would be even worse! You'd end up with clay all over the walls when he got frustrated."

Oh yeah, she was drunk. He wondered just how many she'd had, but he knew from experience that asking would be a bad idea. "Well, you're laughing, so I guess you're enjoying yourselves," he replied cautiously, choosing not to comment on the issues of Logan and potting clay.

She giggled. "Oh yeah, we're enjoying ourselves. I think I've gained ten pounds since I left work today. You might have to roll me out of bed tomorrow morning. So, what are you up to? Did I hear Mike in the background?"

"Yeah. We're playing pool."

Alex went off into another gale of laughter and half-heartedly covered the phone while she turned to Barek and announced, "Hey, they're playing _pool_."

"I knew it!" the other woman said, loudly enough that Bobby could hear her clearly.

Bobby cleared his throat, trying to regain Alex's attention.

"Oh, sorry," she said after a second. "It's just, Carolyn was saying she didn't think Logan knew of anything fun that could be done without women, except maybe pool. Guess she was right."

He glanced over his shoulder at Logan, who was looking at him expectantly, and then returned his attention to the phone with a smirk. "Well, pool wasn't actually his first choice."

"Really?" Alex said in his ear a split second before Logan yanked the phone from his hand and gave him a warning look.

"Give that back," Bobby commanded, glaring.

Logan continued to scowl. "You tell her about that, I kill you."

Rolling his eyes at the threat, he snatched the phone back. "Sorry, Alex. Logan's a sore loser."

"We're tied, you idiot!" Mike growled behind him.

Bobby looked at him in exasperation. "Would you _shut up_?"

"What the hell are you two doing over there?" Alex demanded. "I swear to god, Bobby, if you're fighting with him . . .!"

"I'm not!" he protested. "I promise. He was just . . . pointing out that he hasn't technically _lost. _At least, yet."

"Yet?" Alex asked, a smirk almost audible in her voice. "You mean you've actually lost a game to him? That's pathetic, Goren!"

"He's been making me drink cheap beer. It's messing with my game."

Alex snorted. "Sure, right. How drunk are you, partner?"

"A lot less drunk than you sound," he countered. "How many bottles of wine have you two gone through?"

"Only one," Alex said haughtily. "It would be a crime to waste good wine on this kind of night, But . . . it did take me almost a whole jug of mudslide mix to get Barek talking about Logan."

"Alex!" he could hear Barek yelling in the background. "Don't you dare -"

"But she's not drunk enough yet to stop caring that she told me," Alex told him wryly. "You get anything out of Logan?"

He glanced at the other man, who was alternately taking swigs of beer and looking at Bobby warily. "Quite a bit, actually. Fascinating case study."

"Yeah? Tell me! Oh, wait, is he standing right there?"

"Unfortunately. I'll have to tell you later. What do you guys have planned for the rest of the night, anyway?"

"Well, actually . . ." Alex paused, and Bobby could hear her whispering to Barek in the background before she spoke into the phone again. "We were kind of wondering if you guys were interested in some teammates for those pool games. If you're not too busy male-bonding, that is."

Bobby thought about that for a second before turning and elbowing Logan. "They want to know if they can come play a few games with us."

"Literally, or figuratively?" Logan asked wryly, setting his cue back on the floor so he could lean on it. "I've about met my quota of the figurative kind for this week."

"Probably both. But technically, I think they're referring to the literal sense of the word."

Logan pondered that for a few seconds. "You think they're still sober enough to get themselves here without getting into trouble?"

"Good point. Alex?" he said, returning his attention to the phone. "We're about six blocks from Barek's place. Are you guys still sober enough to walk down here without, uh . . ." He stopped there, opting not to make a joke that might antagonize her.

"Without what?" Alex asked teasingly. "Getting ourselves arrested? Yeah, I think we're sober enough to handle that. The question is, are you guys still sober enough to handle us once we get there?"

Bobby looked at Logan and considered that. "Well, _I _am. I can't speak for him."

"You'll do. We'll see you in a little while."

* * *

The women appeared about twenty minutes later, strolling into the pool hall arm-in-arm with each other. "You think they've really managed to not get in a fight yet?" Carolyn asked thoughtfully as she scanned the room, looking for the familiar faces of their partners.

"Who the hell knows anymore, when it comes to them?" Alex said with a shrug. "I'm starting to think they do it just because they think fighting is as fun an activity as anything else."

"Not true," a low voice murmured in her ear an instant before she was pulled off the ground by a pair of arms that slid around her waist from behind. "I can think of at least one activity I like better."

"Why, Mike," she breathed dramatically, purposely identifying the wrong man, "I never knew you cared."

The arms tightened in retaliation and he bent his head to nip her ear.

Alex put up a nominal struggle to escape her partner's hold. "Put me down, you big lug!"

"Yeah, ya big lug," Logan mimicked. "Put her down. We've got a game to finish."

Carolyn sighed. "Figures. I get stuck with the guy that's only interested in pool when he's drunk."

"What, you want to be picked up too?" Logan looked at her appraisingly for a second, then, without warning, wrapped an arm around her waist and summarily hauled her off the ground.

"Mike!" she squeaked, reflexively grabbing at his forearm.

He just grinned at her shocked response. "Come on, Goren," he announced cheerfully as he adjusted his partner's weight against his side. "We've got a game to finish."

With a smirk, Bobby casually shifted Alex to his left arm, freeing his right and - only incidentally, of course - matching Logan's display of strength. "I'm ready when you are."

"You know," Alex said with a sigh, tipping her head back to see his face as he began to tote her back to the table he and Logan had been playing at, "this isn't exactly what we meant when we said we wanted to play with you guys."

"You can play the winner," he said placatingly, ducking his head to kiss her cheek. Then, keeping his head down and his voice low, he added, "And Barek can play Logan."

"Was that 'play,'" she asked mischievously, glancing at the other couple as Bobby set her back on her feet next to the table, "or 'play with'?"

"Probably both," Carolyn replied, overhearing their exchange as she hit the ground next to Alex. "Personally, I think the next game should be me and Alex against you two."

"I think I like that idea," Alex said, a slow grin spreading across her face. "Go on, you guys - finish your game while me and Carolyn go get ourselves some drinks."

* * *

"Damn it, Barek!" Logan grumbled an hour later, watching the cue ball he'd just hit drop into a corner pocket of the table.

"What'd I do?" she replied innocently, withdrawing her fingertips from under the back of his shirt. They were starting their second battle-of-the-sexes game, and when the men had beaten the women handily in the first game with the simple strategy of sinking so many of their balls that the women hardly got to touch the table, Carolyn had decided it was time for a few changes in the status quo.

"You know exactly what you did," he told her with a look that told her he wasn't buying the innocence act. "And don't think I won't retaliate, either!"

"Not right now, you won't," Alex informed him, watching their interaction with amusement. "You scratched, my friend. I believe it's my turn now."

"Oh, fine, take your turn," Logan grumbled, stepping back to make room for her at the edge of the table. "But I'd watch my back if I were you," he added, feinting for her playfully.

Alex snorted. "You touch me, you lose your hand," she warned, prodding him in the stomach with her cue to get him to move farther away. She lined up her shot, then glanced back over her shoulder at him. "We women aren't the easy targets you . . . agh!"

The cue ball hit the side of the table at top speed and was saved from bouncing off it entirely only by Barek's quick reflexes as she slapped a hand down on top of the ball.

Logan burst out laughing and pointed mockingly at Alex, the way a schoolchild would.

Alex muttered something obscene and stomped on her partner's foot.

Bobby pulled his foot away and, trying to look innocent, put another few inches of space between them.

"I don't think he can actually do that in public, Eames," Logan pointed out in response to her curse. "We'd have to arrest him."

She gave him a death glare, then turned and gave Bobby a shove. "That wasn't fair, Goren!"

Unable to suppress his mirth any longer, Goren grinned. "It wasn't fair when Barek did it to Logan, either."

"So get revenge on _Barek_! Do I _look _like Barek to you?" she shot back.

Bobby thought for a second about how to answer that. "No, but grabbing _her _ass wouldn't have screwed up _your _shot. Not to mention it probably would have got me killed by one or more of the three of you."

Alex huffed and threw up her hands in exasperation. "So we're going to play dirty now, huh?" she asked after a few seconds, looking from Barek to Logan to Goren. "Is that how it is?"

"Looks like it," Barek said with a smirk.

"Yup," Logan agreed, nodding affably.

Bobby just looked at her and shrugged.

Alex took in all their reactions, then smiled craftily. "Ok, then. You're on, boys."

* * *

And so began their game of romantic "chicken," played on and around the pool table.

Bobby's next turn followed the one he'd caused Alex to bungle, and she was more than happy to return the favor. As he started to move his cue forward from its drawn-back position, he was startled by the small hand that slid into his right hip pocket. Somehow managing to retain a vestige of his concentration even though her hand was right _there_, he sank the five and turned a smug smile on his partner.

Keeping her hand where it was, she returned the smile. Since he'd sunk a ball, he got to shoot again now . . . and she had plenty more tricks up her sleeve.

Just before his cue would have hit the ball on his next shot, Alex slipped her other hand into his other pocket, an act which resulted in her being pressed against his back so that she could reach both pockets at once - and she had no qualms about exploiting that position.

The cue ball stayed on the table, but didn't even come close to doing anything productive. Bobby watched it roll to a stop, then looked over his shoulder at Alex, who was grinning up at him from her position against his back. "You going to be there for a while?" he asked, both amused and annoyed by her tactics "Or can I move away from the table now?"

"Far be it from me," she said with laughing politeness, and removed both her hands and herself. "Carolyn, you're up."

Barek picked up her cue, eyed her partner warily, and took a step toward the table. A few seconds later, just before she started moving her arm to make her shot, she jumped at the sensation of Logan's hand on the skin just above the waistband of her jeans. As with Bobby's last shot, the cue ball remained on the table but did no good for the score of either team. "Mike!" she huffed, pulling his hand away and turning to face him.

"You started it," he pointed out with a smirk as he took her place at the edge of the table. "The rest of us are just playing along."

And so it continued. Barek failed to distract Logan with the fingers-under-the-shirt technique that had worked earlier, but her nip at his ear the next time around was a success, making him scratch again. He retaliated by trailing his fingers across the back of her neck on her next turn, an act which he knew from past experience would cause goosebumps, if not a shiver. It worked, and her distracted shot sent the cue ball on a wild run around the table, somehow managing to not hit any other balls before it came to rest.

Goren and Eames, who were playing the game - both games, actually - at a much higher level, amused themselves by seeing who could come closest to which body part on the other without breaking the barrier into public groping. In between near-gropes, they continued to be the only players sinking any balls at all, although even that was at a much slower rate than it would have been in a sober, non-groping game.

Finally, Bobby sank the eight ball, more by luck than by skill. He glanced at Logan and Barek, who had fallen into a quasi-argument about whether he was allowed to rest his hand on her behind in public, and then looked at his partner. "Come here," he told her, taking hold of her arm and drawing her out of earshot of the other couple.

Alex, not having expected the pull, tripped over her feet and fell against him, to which, uncharacteristically, she reacted with just a giggle. "What's up?" she asked as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders to keep her upright.

"Your blood-alcohol level, first off," he teased with a grin. "I think you're even drunker than you were when you guys got here."

"Well," she countered with a halfhearted pout, "drinking fast enough to keep up with you and Logan might have something to do with it. So don't blame me, buddy."

Although it was clear that she was thoroughly drunk, he saw none of the signs of so-drunk-I'll-get-sick-ness he had learned to recognize in her, so he just shrugged and moved on to the topic he had pulled her away to discuss. "Are you coming home tonight?"

She blinked in confusion, then appeared to be considering the question. "Uh, you're going to have to be more specific, Bobby. Whose home?"

"What? Oh, I don't care about that part. I'm just asking if you're going to stay over at Barek's or not."

"As opposed to at Mike's?" she smirked.

"Alex."

"Sorry, sorry." She shrugged. "I haven't decided yet. Why, do you need me?"

"You have to ask?" he asked, pretending to misunderstand the question as he leaned down to steal a kiss. "I always need you, Eames."

She elbowed him in the stomach, mumbling into his mouth, "You know what I meant."

"Mmm." He looked over his shoulder at Logan and Barek and was amused to find that Barek was now poking her partner in the chest accusatorily. "I'm not so much interested in whether _you'll_ be with me as I am whether _she'll_ be with him," he told Alex, jerking his head toward the other couple.

"Well, gee," she said dryly, "I love you too, Goren."

"Well, sorry to tell you, Eames, but you're a sure thing these days."

She stared at him, wide-eyed, in response to that. "Bobby!"

He couldn't help but chuckle at the look on her face. "Well, you're that kind of sure thing, too. But what I meant," he said, dropping his head down to the level of hers and slewing his eyes toward Logan and Barek, "is that for us, tonight isn't going to have important implications for our relationship. Whereas with them . . ."

"Oh, face it," she teased, slipping her arms around his waist and giving him a smug look. "You're turning into a matchmaker. You want to tell me what Logan told you, now?"

He grinned. "I forgot about that. Essentially, he really likes her, but he's not going to come out and admit to her because he's afraid of rejection. Oh," he added, his smile widening, "and I don't know what she told you about their, uh, physical relationship, but he says they're not sleeping together."

"Yeah?" she asked with renewed interest. "Did he say why?"

"He doesn't want to push her, mostly. And the timing just hasn't worked out."

"And Carolyn," Alex replied, stealing a glance at her, "says they just haven't gotten there _yet. _She also says she's not sure if he's even interested in anything beyond sex. But I think I see where you're going with this," she went on with a smile. "Their defense mechanisms are about as down tonight as they'll ever get."

"Mmhmm." He tightened his arms around her. "Have I mentioned lately that I love it when you read my mind?"

"Hah." She shifted her hips against him pointedly. "If I could read your mind right now, I'd be blushing."

Bobby gave her a you-caught-me grin. "You'll never know if you don't take me home with you tonight."

With a roll of her eyes, she pulled away far enough to punch his arm. "You sound like you're trying for a cheap bar pick-up." Still smirking, she let the silence stretch out for a few seconds before adding, "Lucky for you, I happen to _be_ an easy pick-up. You want to tell them, or should I?"

His response was to pick her up, literally, until she was nose-to-nose with him, and kiss her soundly. "I think we can get the message across without saying too much. Shall we?"

"Good point. You gotta put me down so we can go tell-but-not-tell them, though."

"Unfortunately."

"Chin up, partner," she said, giving him a playful pat on the cheek as he set her down. "You can manhandle me all you want once we get back to my place."

Bobby grinned as they headed back to the table. "I bet that's the last time I'm ever going to hear that sentence out of your mouth."

"Mmm," Alex agreed. "Better enjoy it while it lasts." Then, without pause, she turned to Logan and Barek and offered them a smile. "So, guys . . ."


	13. Wakeup call

A/N: Just a little plot/fluff transition chapter before we get back to the case

* * *

The clock next to her bed read three o'clock when the ringing of a phone pulled Alex out of her deep, drunken sleep. With her eyes still closed, she groaned and sat up, fumbling blindly for the cell phone on her nightstand and, in the process, displacing the arm Bobby had slung across her hips in his sleep. "This better be good," she told her caller groggily when she finally managed to get the phone open.

"Uh . . . yeah, hi," said a sheepish voice. "It's Dan. I'm really sorry to call you this late, but I thought you'd want to know."

Her eyes popped open and she propped herself up on her elbow. "You got something?"

Next to her, Bobby, who had been playing dead in case the person on the other end of the line was Deakins with a call-out, rolled onto his side and looked at her, raising his eyebrows questioningly as he reached for her. "Dan Lowe," she whispered to him.

"Detective Eames?" said the voice in her ear.

Dan must have heard her whisper. Whoops. "Sorry. I'm listening."

"Am I interrupting anything?" he asked, managing to make the question sound apologetic, but at the same time, fascinated.

"Nah," she mumbled, pushing away her partner's hand as it started to roam. "Just me sleeping off all the beer I drank tonight."

"Ah, sorry. I'll keep it short. You don't need to do anything right this minute anyway, I just thought you'd want to hear." The tapping of his fingers on his keyboard was audible through the phone line as he talked.

"Hear _what_, Dan? If you don't get to the point fast, I might fall asleep before you get a chance to tell me it."

"Uh, sure." Dan cleared his throat, then announced, "I have this friend . . . an online friend, I mean . . . he hangs out in the same IRC channel I do, and he got burned by the Kings last year."

"Burned?" she said, turning onto her back and elbowing Bobby in the ribs to get him to make room for her. "How so?"

"Well, he was kind of a hanger-on with them for a while, but he did something - I'm not sure what - that pissed off one of the members, and they blacklisted him. He's pissed."

Alex could feel a satisfied grin spreading over her face. "Pissed enough to talk to us?"

"He's not exactly looking forward to it," he said, "but I got him to agree that he would. You guys are lucky that he actually lives here in the City and not in Siberia or something like half my other online friends."

"Got contact information?" she asked shortly, her thoughts turning to how they should handle this potential witness.

"Is it ok if I get it to you in the morning?" The typing sounds increased in tempo. "He's kind of having a shit fit right now."

"Tomorrow's fine, Dan," she replied. "But don't you ever sleep?"

"Red Bull and caffeine-laced mints," Dan answered distractedly.

"Uh . . . ok, then. You go back to your caffeine and your counseling session. I'm going back to sleep. Stop by my desk in the morning, ok?"

"Yeah, sure. Sorry again for waking you up."

Alex grunted something resembling a goodbye and flipped the phone closed, tossing it in the general direction of her nightstand. "Witness," she mumbled, turning over to face Bobby.

He wrapped his arm around her again, pulling her in for a kiss. "Is he accessible? Or are we going to be doing this over e-mail?"

"Dan says he lives in the City," she mumbled, brushing her lips against his neck. "He's going to get me the guy's contact info tomorrow."

"Hmm." He trailed one hand down to rest in the small of her back, holding her to him. "As much as I don't feel like moving right now, I think it's only fair that if we got woken up for this, Logan and Barek get woken up too."

Throwing one of her legs over his, she smirked. "You're cruel. Can you reach your phone? I threw mine, and there's no way I'm sitting up again before morning."

"Yeah." He twisted around to grab his phone off the nightstand and handed it to her. "Here."

Giving him an affectionate roll of her eyes at his delegation of the task, she opened his phone and dialed Barek's phone number.

The phone was answered after five rings by an annoyed-sounding masculine grunt.

Pressing her face into Bobby's skin, Alex struggled against the urge to burst out laughing for a few seconds before she could pick up her head again and say, "And good morning to you, too, Mike."

This time the grunt sounded alarmed. It was followed by a few seconds of muffled noise that Alex tentatively identified as him shoving the phone at his partner, and then Barek's voice came on the line. "Who is this and why are you calling me at three o'clock in the morning?"

"Well," Alex teased, "I'd like to say it's because we wanted to see if your partner was sleeping over . . . but actually, I just got woken up by a call from Dan Lowe five minutes ago, so I'm passing on his news."

"Mmph."

She took that as a request for more information. "He's got a friend who got blacklisted by the Net Kings, and - Bobby!" she broke off to whisper harshly as his hand ventured down from where it had come to rest in the small of her back. When he just grinned at her and used his other hand to trace a line up from her belly button, she retaliated by tightening her leg and pressing closer to him.

"Uh, Alex?" Carolyn said.

"Sorry. He thinks it's even funnier than I do that Logan just answered your phone."

"Oh, bite me. You're the ones who were telling me I should take him home with me. Now would you please tell me what it is you need to tell me, so I can go back to sleep?"

Given where Bobby's hands had moved on to now, Alex thought that getting off the phone was a fantastic idea. "He's got a friend who's willing to talk to us about the Net Kings. He's going to give me the contact information in the morning," she summarized. "There, now you can go back to sleep. Oh, but Carolyn?" she added.

"What?"

"Tell him to check the caller ID before he answers your phone again. This wouldn't have been nearly as amusing if I was Deakins."

There was a thump and then a gasp on Barek's end of the line. "Sure," she told Alex brightly as the the gasp turned into a wheeze in the background. "Point taken - by _both _of us."

"Good. See you in the morning."

"Yeah. Night."

"Night."

She closed Bobby's phone and shoved it against his chest with mock-annoyance. "What, you can't keep your hands to yourself for five minutes?"

He made a show of looking thoughtful at that before shaking his head firmly and saying, "Nope. " Reaching back to drop his phone on the nightstand, he grinned at her and rolled onto his back, pulling her on top of him.

Alex snickered and relaxed her muscles, draping her body over his. "If I'd known getting you drunk led to this, I'd have done it long ago."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Alex?"

"What?"

"Stop talking."


	14. The morning after

A/N: Sucky transition chapter. Not one of my favorites.

* * *

Alex was sitting with her head down on her desk the next morning, attempting to convince it to stop pounding, when a voice said teasingly from beside her, "Good morning, gorgeous."

"You better be hungover too, Mike," she replied without lifting her head, "or I'm not talking to you."

"Well, I have a headache," he supplied. "Does that count?"

"No." Moving with slow caution, she picked up her head and squinted at him. "Where's your partner?"

"Probably on her way upstairs. Where's yours?"

Alex hooked a thumb over her shoulder toward Deakins's office, where Goren could be seen in conversation with the captain. "Explaining."

He dropped into Bobby's chair and looked at her curiously. "Explaining what? Your hangover?"

"How about 'why you picked up Barek's phone at three in the morning'?" she shot back with a smirk.

Logan's head whipped to the side and he stared in alarm at Goren's back for a second before it sunk in that she hadn't been serious. "Don't _do _that!"

She grinned. "Better get used to it. Why isn't Carolyn with you?"

He shrugged. "I went home this morning. Didn't seem like a good idea to waltz in here together, with me still in the clothes I wore yesterday."

"Hmm," she said with a slight nod. "Fair enough. How's she feeling?"

"About as bad as you are," he said with a sigh. "Maybe worse. She's -"

"Get up," commanded a voice from behind him.

Logan glanced over his shoulder and nodded a hello to Bobby. "Someone's cranky."

"Someone's in my chair," Bobby replied with a shrug. "Up, Logan. Where's Barek?"

Rolling his eyes, Logan stood up and moved to stand next to Goren's chair..

Alex let out a low whistle as she finally spotted the other woman across the room. Barek had a hand to her forehead as if she was fighting a headache, and her face was a few shades too pale. "Hoo boy, this is going to be a fun morning. Mike, go get the poor girl some coffee or something."

He glanced over his shoulder, following her gaze, and then looked back at her. Crossing his arms, he contrived to look offended. "Give me a little credit, Alex. I'm way ahead of you," he told her, waving a hand toward the large cup of Starbucks coffee that sat on Barek's desk.

"Well, good for you. Maybe you're not hopeless after all."

"Doubtful." Elbowing Logan aside, Bobby took possession of his chair. "You left her alone like that?"

"What'd you expect me to do? Take her from her place to my place to work?"

Bobby shrugged dismissively. "I'm just saying, she doesn't look too good."

"No shit, Sherlock," Logan replied with another roll of his eyes. "You'd look bad too if you'd gotten sick twice since getting woken up at three in the morning by a rude friend and her ruder partner."

Alex winced. "Ouch. Is she ok to be here?"

He shrugged. "If she throws up on the floor, that's going to be a sign it's a 'no.' Otherwise, yeah."

"You're the soul of consideration, Logan," Barek said dryly as she came to a stop next to Alex's desk. "And discretion, too, apparently. Morning, guys."

"Morning, Barek." Goren paused for a moment to take a closer look at her. "You look like you could use that coffee Logan brought you."

"What . . . Mike, you brought me coffee?" she asked, looking at her partner in pleased surprised.

"Uh . . ." He looked down nervously and scuffed the heel of his shoe into the carpet. "Yeah. I figured you'd need something that didn't taste like motor oil."

"He got you_ Starbucks _coffee," Alex informed her with a grin. "I think you have to keep him now."

"Hmm." Carolyn gave her partner a speculative look. "You're right, I might have to. Point me to the coffee." When three hands pointed toward her desk, she smiled at them one more time and headed for the life-giving liquid.

"Cute," Logan said sarcastically, returning his eyes to Alex. "Should I start calling you Yenta?"

With a snort, she shook her head. "I'd look terrible in a babushka. You're going to have to do your own matchmaking, my friend."

"Should I ask how you know what you'd look like in a babushka?" asked a voice from behind her left shoulder.

"Dan!" She spun her chair around to face the tech. "Logan was accusing me of being a matchmaker. Doesn't matter. You have something for me?"

Dan pretended to study her face and hair, then tapped his chin thoughtfully with one finger. "I don't think you'd look so bad, but you'd have to have the right pattern on the fabric . . ." He broke off, dodging the annoyed swat Alex directed at him. "Should I take that to mean 'get to the point'?"

"Well, if _she _didn't mean it," Logan spoke up, "_I _do. Get to the point!"

"Wonderful," Goren announced with a sigh of resignation, glancing at Logan, then looking to Alex for sympathy. "A hangover just makes him meaner."

"What, you thought dry-mouth and a pounding head would turn him into Mr. Congeniality?" Barek teased as she returned from her coffee-seeking mission. "Personally, I can deal with the grunts and bitchiness as long as he keeps buying me coffee. Morning, Dan."

The tech blinked, catching up with what she'd said, then offered her a smile. "Morning. I was just about to tell these guys about my friend."

"Don't let me hold things up." Taking a sip of coffee, she leaned back against Alex's desk and looked at Dan expectantly.

He chuckled. "Ok, ok, I get it. His name's Gary Brooks, but everybody online knows him as Cringer, and he's -"

"Cringer?" Alex interrupted. "As in, one who cringes? Why would a guy voluntarily call himself something as un-macho as that?"

Goren gave her an amused look and Logan snickered in response to that, but Dan just shrugged and said, "Uh, it's actually 'Cringer' as in 'the alter-ego of Battle-Cat'."

Three blank faces and one raised eyebrow greeted that statement, and there were a few second of silence before Logan lowered his eyebrow and said dubiously, "He got his name from a cartoon character?"

His partner looked at him curiously. "A cartoon character?"

"Uh, yeah," he said, beginning to look embarrassed as he realized that he was the only one who'd recognized the name. "Cringer's the tiger from the He-Man cartoons. When He-Man turned into He-Man, Cringer turned into Battle-Cat." He paused, taking in their amused reactions. "What? Lennie's grandkids used to watch it."

"And you remember this ten years later . . .why?" prompted Barek.

"Shut up," he muttered halfheartedly, then turned back to Dan. Giving the younger man a pointed look, he ordered, "Keep talking."

"Yessir." Dan leaned back against the corner of Eames's desk and crossed his arms. "Like I said, we call him Cringer, and he and I hang out in some of the same IRC rooms. He's a couple years younger than me - I think he only graduated college a year or two ago - and he's doing a masters at NYU now, but he keeps up with the rest of us pretty well. Turns out he knew one of your dead guys, and -"

"What?"

"_What?"_

_"_You're shittin' me!"

"Which one?"

Dan eased back a step from the babbling pack of detectives and held up a hand for silence. " 'Jeremy' something-or-other. They went to school together. Anyway, he was kind of on the fringes of the group, but he can give you background if that's what you're looking for. I wrote down his -" Before Dan had even fully extended his arm, two hands were snatching at the piece of paper he was holding.

"Mine!" Alex said sharply, jumping to her feet and trying to pull the paper away from Logan, who had it in a death grip.

"Down, girl," he told her with a smirk, raising his hand out of her reach. "You guys aren't lead on this one, remember?"

"Neither are you," she shot back. "So share the wealth, would you?"

Leaning forward to peer between the warring detectives, Barek coughed pointedly at Goren and gave him a look that clearly said, _Do something to break this up, you idiot!_

Obediently, he cleared his throat and laid a hand on his partner's arm. "Eames -"

"Yeah, yeah." His message was clear in his tone of voice, and with a sigh she backed up a step. "You know, it would be nice to see _you _get it away from him, seeing as you're the one who's his size."

Dan, who had been watching the events of the past few seconds with fascination, looked from Goren to Logan and tried to hide a smirk. "You know, I think technically, Detective Goren's got a few inches on Detective Logan."

Alex, taking advantage of Logan's split-second of hesitation in response to that comment, launched herself off the ground and snatched the paper out of his hand, then scurried around to the other side of the desks and grinned at Dan. "Thanks. That was good timing."

Logan scowled at her and started to look to his partner for support, but found her sniggering into her coffee. "Oh, some back-up you are."

Grinning, Barek shook her head. "Why do you even try to go up against her anymore? Haven't you learned your lesson yet?"

"Hmph." Crossing his arms, he leaned back against the corner of Goren's desk and glared from one woman to the other. "Apparently not. I should know better after hanging out with _you_, too."

"You're right, you should," Alex said agreeably, looking down at the paper she was now holding. "Is this his home address, Dan?"

"Uh, yeah. Look, do me a favor and try not to act _too _weird when you talk to him? He's freaked out enough as it is."

Barek snickered again and shook her head despairingly. "Yeah, right. With this crew, you'll be lucky if the kid survives the interview."

"Hey, no comments from the peanut gallery," Logan chastised, neatly relieving her of her coffee in retaliation. "Aren't you supposed to be too hungover to have an opinion?"

Barek promptly jammed her right heel into the toe of his shoe. "Give that back."

"Apologize, and I will."

Planting her hands on her hips, she said through gritted teeth, "Logan!"

Before Logan could move, he found himself minus one cup of coffee. "What the . . .?"

"Let the woman have her coffee," Goren told him coolly, handing the cup back to Barek. "It'll be safer for all of us." Turning back to his partner, he bent over slightly to see the paper she held. "Is he somewhere we can get to today?"

"Harlem," she said, nodding. "So yeah - assuming he's got time to talk to us today." She looked up at Dan . "Does he?"

"Yeah. I told him you guys aren't noted for your patience. He's expecting a call."

"Bobby, take this," Alex ordered, handing the slip of paper to her partner.

Confused, Goren did as ordered and took hold of the paper, then watched with amusement as Alex, without warning, grabbed Dan's face in her hands and gave him a smacking kiss on the cheek. "This is great, Dan. Thanks. Let us know when you want to do dinner."

Dan reflexively lifted a hand to rub away the smear of lipstick she'd left him. "Don't do that!"

She grinned. "What? You afraid Tom might see and think you've changed teams?"

"Oh, bite me." Rolling his eyes, he looked around at the other three detectives. "Let me know if you need any more geek support, guys. The tech department's having the time of their lives with this case."

"Will do," Barek said agreeably, giving him a smile and watching as he turned and made his way back to the elevators. When he was out of earshot, she drained the last sip of her coffee and thrust the empty cup at her partner. "Throw this out for me?"

Making no move to take hold of the cup, Logan slowly looked down at it then back up at her. "You can reach the trash can from where you are."

"So can you."

"It's your coffee."

"You bought it." After a quick glance around the room to make sure no one was listening too closely, she leaned toward him and added in a low voice, "And don't forget, you owe me for screwing up last night."

Logan, tacitly admitting defeat at that, sighed and reluctantly took the cup from her. "How long are you going to use that against me?"

She gave him a beatific smile. "Until it stops being useful. Now," she added, returning her attention to the group as a whole, "who's going to talk to Gary Brooks?"

"Me and you," Eames said before either man could speak. "We speak geek better than the guys."

"Plus," Barek added, smirking pointedly at her partner, "it's been noted that we're a lot prettier than they are."

"Hey, I didn't -"

"Mike!" Alex huffed, easily understanding the subtext of Barek's statement.

"What?" he asked, giving her a look of wide-eyed innocence. "It's an observable fact. Me and Goren may be brilliant, but we're never going to win any beauty contests."

Giving him a teasing smile, Alex patted her partner's shoulder. "Little does he know about the time you were named Miss Coney Island, huh?"

Barek choked on a breath and burst out laughing. "Do you mind? The image of Bobby in a teeny-weeny bikini isn't something I want rolling around in my head."

"Oh, _man_!" Logan groaned, giving her shoulder a push. "Go do your interview before I get sick at the thought of that!"

"We're going," Alex said, pulling her jacket off the back of her chair. "No fights while we're gone, you two. Got it?"

The men exchanged a look, then returned their eyes to her. "Yes, dear," Logan sighed, doing his best to look put-upon. "We know. If we fight, we don't get dessert."

" 'Dessert'," Barek echoed with a smirk. "Yeah, you could call it that. Come on, Alex."

Alex gave both men a wide grin and elbowed Goren playfully before turning to face the other woman. "Right behind ya."

A/N: I don't know if Lenny Briscoe had grandkids. I know he had a daughter, so I figured it was at least possible. Let me know if anyone knows for sure.


	15. Gary Brooks

Two young, attractive women with guns on their hips were obviously not what Gary Brooks had anticipated when he had agreed to be interviewed by the police. Brooks, a tall, thin young man with skin the color of mahogany, stood at the door of his apartment, one hand holding the heavy metal door open and the other propped against the opposite side of the doorway, and just stared from Eames to Barek and back for a full ten seconds before he managed to get any words out. "You're . . . the cops?"

The women, neither of whom was unacquainted with being stared at in the course of their job, exchanged a look of amusement. "Yeah," Barek said after a second, giving him a winning smile, "we're the cops. Mind if we come in?"

"Oh, uh, sure." He dropped his hand and stepped back, unblocking the doorway. "Yeah, come in. Can I get you g- . . . uh, ladies anything? Something to drink?"

"Some water would be nice," Eames said, copying Barek's smile as she slipped past the apartment's owner.

"Coming right up. You can sit down, uh . . ." Brooks looked around the cramped front room of his apartment and shrugged helplessly. ". . . anywhere you can find."

The women watched him disappear, then looked at each other again. "This is . . . interesting," Barek murmured, pushing aside a stack of computer print-outs to sit down on what she thought might have been a couch under all the clutter that covered it.

"No kidding." Alex glanced over her shoulder, checking to see where their host was, then sat down beside her. "He's cute. Not a bad place, for this neighborhood, too. Although the decor kind of reminds me of Dan's office . . ."

Barek looked around, taking in the living room they were in. "It looks like a filing cabinet exploded in here."

"Exactly." Eames picked up a handful of the papers she was trying not to sit on. "Code." Another handful. "A read-me. Pretty standard stuff for a geek, I guess. He must spend a fortune on ink."

"He's probably got geek dealers that get it for him at a discount."

Alex shrugged. "Better ink than weed. At least this way we don't have to arrest him before we even -" She broke off abruptly as Brooks reappeared in the doorway holding two glasses. "Nice place, Mr. Brooks."

He blinked, looking taken aback at her compliment. "Uh, thanks. But you can call me Gary. Or Cringer. Whatever. Sorry I took so long," he added with a nervous smile. "I didn't want to give you tap water, and it's been a while since I used my Brita . . ."

"The Brita fought back?" Barek asked with a grin as she accepted her glass.

"Something like that," Brooks admitted sheepishly. "Electronics, I can handle, but somehow a charcoal filter beats me every time. When I had a roommate, he used to kludge the . . . uh, never mind," he said, seeming to realize that he had been about to start babbling. "Dan said you guys have questions for me. About . . . about the Kings?"

"Yeah," Alex said, giving her best attempt at a comforting smile. "This is all real informal, though. Have a seat and talk to us." She waved a hand invitingly at a beat-up looking chair, the only other seating in the room, as if she owned the place.

"Ok." Obediently, Gary sat, automatically shifting a neoprene laptop case and an old mouse out of his way. "This is about . . . about Jeremy, right? And who killed him?"

"Yes," Barek said with a nod. "We're very sorry to bother you when you've just lost a friend, but we need any information you can give us about the Net Kings -"

"But first," Alex interjected smoothly, "we want to get a little background on you. What you do, how you got connected to the group . . ."

Barek, annoyed at being overruled, gave her a dirty look but opted to say nothing, at least in front of the witness.

Brooks laid a hand flat on the arm of the chair, fingers absently tapping against the leather as if he was typing as he thought about Alex's statement. "Well, I'm in grad school," he finally said with a shrug. "In CS, at NYU. So I'm kind of a geek by default because of my department, and I've been programming ever since BASIC was the state-of-the-art. It kind of seemed . . . normal to get in with the Kings. And I knew Jeremy, so I just kind of . . ." He shrugged again. "Hung around."

Barek nodded understandingly. "Dan told us you went to school with Jeremy. Is that right?"

"Yeah. NYU. We had a lot of classes together, so we ended up being kind of thrown together in study groups and stuff . . ." He shrugged. "He was a cool guy. Didn't even bat an eye when he saw my building the first time, either."

Barek's eyebrows went up slightly. "Not a lot of white, middle-class CS majors are comfortable when surrounded by a bunch of black guys going about their lives, huh?"

Eames froze, wondering what the hell Barek was thinking to say something so blunt, and stole a glance at Brooks, expecting to see an offended scowl, at best. Far from looking angry, though, and much to Eames's surprise, the young man was grinning at Barek. "They're liberal and equal-opportunity until they find themselves in the minority. Then they get nervous. Can't really hold it against them, though. They're mostly nice people; it's not their fault it's out of their comfort zone. It's just nice to find a guy who doesn't react like that," he told the women, nodding along with Barek's point. "I'm surprised you came out and said that, though. Most people . . ."

Barek waved a hand dismissively. "I grew up in a 'salad bowl' neighborhood. A whole lot of different types of people, all tossed together. You learn to face the facts fast in a place like that. Anyway," she went on, noticing the impatient look Eames was giving her, "let's get back on the topic. You were friends with Jeremy and . . . he helped you get in with the Net Kings?"

"You could call it that. But I never really got all the way in. SandKing screwed me over."

"SandKing?" Eames echoed. "He's one of the members?"

"Yeah. He has an ego like you wouldn't believe, and I made the mistake of posting to a newsgroup about a bug in one of the code snippets he was passing around." With a look of amused resignation, he slouched down in his chair. "The hacker ego is a fragile thing. Especially for him, apparently."

"Huh," Alex murmured distractedly, trying to listen and jot down notes at the same time. It was a lost cause, though, and after a few seconds she put down her pad and looked up at him. "Did Jeremy interact with, uh, 'SandKing' at all? Friends, enemies . . .?"

"They were tight for a while. I think they knew each other as kids or something. But around the same time SandKing blacklisted me, there was a rumor that they'd fought. I don't know if it had anything to do with what happened to me. It might have. Jeremy's that type."

Barek looked thoughtful. "A stand-up kind of guy, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Do you know SandKing's real name?" Alex asked after a few seconds of silence, picking up her notebook again.

Brooks shook his head. "No, sorry. I don't really know any real-life stuff about the online people who aren't my friends."

"Hmm." Barek leaned back against the couch back and crossed her legs. "What can you tell us about the rumor that the Kings were working on a virus?"

Brooks's eyes widened, and for a second he looked frozen in his seat. "That's bad shit," he finally managed roughly. "You gotta understand, there's people all over the world who'll identify themselves as members of the Kings. The guys here in New York, we're only one cluster. The left hand doesn't always know what the right hand is doing, you know?"

"Uh-huh," Alex said, not missing the fact that he hadn't answered the question "And about the rumor . . .?"

He sighed. "I heard it, too. But I sure as hell wasn't working on it, and I don't think Jeremy was, either. He would have mentioned it to me, at the very least."

"At the least?" Barek echoed. "What do you mean?"

"Jeremy . . ." Brooks shrugged, as if to say there were no words. "I don't think he would have been cool with programming malware, or with anyone else doing it. He was real security-conscious about networking, at home and at work. He'd probably have said something. Posted to the newsgroup, or talked to the guys who were coding it, or something."

Both women suddenly sat up a little straighter as they scented a possible motive. "So he would have tried to keep the virus from being released, somehow or other?" Eames asked, glancing at Barek to see if she'd seized on the same point.

Brooks nodded slowly. "Yeah, I think he would have. Oh, shit, you don't think . . . do you think that's what got him killed?" he asked, looking slightly ill at the thought.

"It's a possibility," Alex admitted gently. "That's why we're so eager to find out whatever we can on the virus and the person who was writing it."

He politely kept his eyes on her face, but she could tell that he was trying to quiet his whirling thoughts. After a few seconds of blankness, his face suddenly hardened and he looked from one woman to the other. "Anyone who'd kill a good guy like Jeremy because of _software . . . _they're sure as hell not anyone I want to help. All I can tell you right now is that it might have been one of the New York guys. My money would be on SandKing, but obviously I'm not his biggest fan to begin with. Word was going around that someone had a hardcore project going. I think Jeremy knew more about it than I did. Oh, god, for a fucking_ virus _. . ." He stopped there, looking like he'd run out of words to convey his thoughts.

"This is good, Gary," Barek said encouragingly, reaching over to pat his knee. "This is the best information we've got since we caught the case."

"Well, good, I guess." He sighed. "I'll keep my eyes and ears open and let you know if I hear anything, believe me. I can't believe someone would . . . god, how fucking _petty _can you be, to kill someone over this?"

Eames gave him a sad smile. "That's one thing you learn fast when you're a cop - how little it takes to convince some people to go out and kill someone. And this guy's got to be right up there with the most pathetic, motive-wise."

"Here," Barek said, holding out her card to him, "take our cards and call us if you hear anything. _Anything_, no matter how distantly you think it might be related."

Alex, who had begun musing on some of the more depressing cases she'd handled, jumped and then did the same when Barek elbowed her pointedly in the side. "I second that. I don't care if it's three o'clock in the morning when you hear it - you _call us_. You can ask Dan, he's done it before and we were happy to hear from him." Well, perhaps it was a bit of an exaggeration to say she'd been happy about being woken up . . . but still, she hadn't been nearly as pissed as she would have been if Dan hadn't had good news.

Brooks nodded and accepted their cards, tucking them into the breast pocket of his shirt. "I will. I, uh . . ." Nervously hooking one thumb into the pocket of his jeans, he sighed. "Thank you for taking this seriously. I know he wasn't a big name or anything, but he was my friend and he mattered to me. He deserves to get justice."

"You're welcome," Barek said solemly as she and Alex stood up and followed him toward the door. "We're going to do everything we can to get him his justice."

"I know." Shaking his head sadly, he opened the door for them. "I'll call if I hear anything."

"Thanks."

Eames waited until the door had closed behind them, then turned to Barek. "I'm thinking 'motive'."

Barek grinned, allowing herself to feel just a tad elated at the useful information they'd gotten. "I'm thinking we go back to One PP and hunt down this SandKing guy, because whoever he is, I've got a _lot _of questions for him."

"Ditto. Let's get moving; I can't wait to see what Goren and Logan think of this."

Barek's grin morphed into a smirk. "I think we're going to have a pair of happy partners this afternoon."

"Sounds good to me." Alex palmed the car keys and pushed open the building door, holding it for the other woman. "Maybe we can talk them into paying for lunch."


	16. Face off

A/N: I've been getting very few hits on this story and I'm a little discouraged (fragile writer's ego, I admit it). Does anyone really want me to continue it, or should I just declare this one DOA?

* * *

"Well maybe if you'd stopped to _look _at me every now and then, you would have realized it!" 

At the sound of the raised female voice coming from the elevator vestibule, Goren and Logan both looked up, then looked at each other. "Isn't that Eames?" Logan asked, eyebrows raised in amusement at the prospect of seeing the usually-calm detective lose her cool.

Bobby just nodded, momentarily speechless at the fact that his partner seemed to have actually lost her temper, then turned his eyes toward the entrance of the room and watched for the source of the noise. "She's got a long fuse, too. Wonder what happened."

Logan leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms above his head, and nodded in the direction Goren was looking. "I think we're about to find out."

"If you hadn't noticed, it's not _my_ job to babysit you during interviews," Barek was snapping when the two women came into view. "And while we're on the subject, it's not _your _job to overrule my questions!"

Well, _that_ didn't sound encouraging. The men looked at each other again, then back to the women, Logan muttering under his breath, "At least it's a change of pace," before looking up and giving his partner his best attempt at a casual smile. "So . . . interview go well?"

Across from him, Bobby groaned quietly in response to that and said nothing when Eames planted herself against the corner of his desk, making a show of scowling at Barek. When that didn't elicit a question about what happened after a few seconds, she moved her glare to the men.

Bobby looked back at her impassively while Logan tried his hardest not to smirk at her.

More silence.

Finally, Logan shot a dirty look at Goren and sighed. "Ok, fine. I'll be the one to sacrifice myself and ask: what happened, you guys?"

"Nothing," Eames snapped.

Barek snorted.

Losing her tenuous hold on her temper, Alex crossed her arms and glared at the other woman. "Fine! Why don't you just go ahead and tell them, then, if you're going to make a point of laughing at me?"

"I think I will," Barek shot back snidely, crossing her arms and turning toward the men. "_Your _partner," she told Goren, stabbing a finger in Alex's direction, "has an obsession with being in charge of interviews. How the hell do you put up with her?"

It was Eames's turn to snort derisively. "At least _I'm_ not the one who went into a spiel about how black people make white people uncomfortable - to a black guy!"

Bobby blinked and, looking at Barek, said cautiously, "Are you sure you didn't just misinterpret something? Eames hasn't ever given me that impression, in all the years we've been working together."

"Yeah, there's definitely something wrong with this picture," Logan agreed, studying his partner. "Barek's the one of us who's actually _got _some tact. I can't picture her saying something racist."

Barek promptly swatted him in the back of the head. "That's because I didn't, you idiot!"

Eames rolled her eyes and slouched a little more against the desk."Hah."

"Did he _look _offended to you?" Barek demanded. "He friggin' agreed with me, even if you didn't, Alex!"

Before Alex could reply, Deakins, who had followed the raised voices out of his office and to their desks, stepped between her and Barek, holding out his arms as if he was afraid they were going to lunge at each other. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. What's going on here?"

"Aw, hell," Logan grumbled, tossing his pen down on his desk. "Figures the boss'd break it up just when things were getting good."

"_Good_?" the women chorused.

"Uh, well, maybe 'interesting' is a better -"

Deakins cleared his throat loudly, then waited for Logan to get the hint. When silence reigned once again, he nodded in satisfaction and looked from Barek to Eames. "What the hell are you guys fighting about? I thought you got along."

"They do," Goren answered before either woman could. "But apparently that's only when they _don't_ have to do interviews together."

"Christ," the captain muttered, rolling his eyes heavenward as if praying for patience. "The last thing I need is more fighting detectives. Settle this," he ordered, pointing a threatening finger at them. "I don't care how; just get it out of your systems. I need you two rational so you can control your partners. Now, I'm going to go back to work, and I don't want to hear any more yelling from any of you for the rest of the day, got it?"

All he got in return was two stony stares and two vaguely amused looks, and with a sigh, he threw up his hands and retreated across the squad room to his office, wondering what the hell had ever possessed him to let the four detectives work together.

"Nice one," Eames sneered, smirking at Barek.

"Oh, don't try to blame -"

"Enough!"

Both women abruptly shut their mouths and stared at Goren, who rarely raised his voice to his coworkers but had now almost shouted the word as he jumped to his feet and seized Alex's arm. "Uh, Bobby," she attempted, trying to ease her arm out of his grip, "shouldn't -"

"No." Not relinquishing his hold on her, he pulled her around to face Logan and Barek. "The captain's right, we need to get this sorted out." Catching Logan's eye, he nodded toward the other end of the squad room. "Conference room?"

Logan blinked, took a second to catch up with the other man's thoughts, then shrugged. "Sure." He got to his feet and reached out a hand to his partner. "C'mon, Barek."

"You grab my arm, you die," she warned him, pointedly ignoring his hand as she stood.

"Hey, no problem." He pulled his hand back with alacrity, not quite able to hide his amusement at seeing the shoe on the other foot. "Shall we?"

Barek rolled her eyes. "Whatever."

* * *

"Ok, we're in the conference room," Alex sighed a few minutes later, yanking her arm away from her partner. "_Now _what do you expect us to do?"

Bobby hadn't actually gotten to that stage in his planning yet, and he took a moment to think about it. He looked down at his watch, then back up at his companions. "I think the first thing we need to do is order in some lunch. I have a feeling this is going to take a while."

"It's not going to take a while! There is _not _a problem here!" Barek snapped, taking a step away from Logan and crossing her arms defensively. "I don't know what you two think needs to be 'worked out,' but last time I checked we had a double murder that needed to be solved before we worry about anything else!"

"Exactly," Alex said with a firm nod. "There's nothing to work out, ok? There were just a few . . . blips in the interview. Nothing you guys need to worry about."

Bobby just looked at her, his disbelief clear on his face. "So you're saying you guys _aren't _angry with each other?"

It took a few seconds for Alex to force the word out, but she finally managed it: "No."

"Oh?" He looked to Barek. "And what do you say?"

"Everything's just fine," she hastily replied, giving him a brittle smile.

Raising his eyebrows pointedly, Bobby moved his attention to Logan, giving him a look that said, _Do you believe this shit?_

_"_Ok, so let me get this straight," Logan said slowly, picking up the conversation where Goren had left off. "You two just had a screaming fight in the middle of the squad room . . . and you're telling us that everything's fine between you?"

Looking pained, both women nodded.

"So that fight was . . . what?" he went on, doing his best to look curious instead of amused. "Revenge for the one me and Goren faked when Deakins thought I was beating Alex up?"

Eames and Barek looked at each other, then quickly switched to looking anywhere _but_ at each other, both falling into sullen silence at the realization that their partners weren't going to let this go.

"Oh, of course. You heard the women, Bobby," Logan announced with exaggerated gravity, turning to look at the other man. "Nothing to see here; move along."

Bobby snorted.

"My thoughts exactly." Logan turned back to the women and gave them a knowing look. "Why don't you just spill it? You both look like you're about to explode, and I don't know about _him_," - he tilted his head toward Bobby - "but _I'm _not too keen on seeing my partner reenact the fistfight part of my and Goren's feud. So vent, ladies, before you get to that point!"

There was a moment of stubborn silence, and then, just as the men were about to look at each other and acknowledge defeat, both women suddenly started talking at once:

"I asked a perfectly good question," Barek hissed, "and _she _walked right over me and asked a question of her own, just because she didn't like the direction I was going in!"

"We're sitting there talking the witness, a young _black_ guy," Alex exclaimed at the same time, "and the genius over here decides it would be a good idea to make a crack about how white people think black people are intimidating. We're lucky she didn't get us booted out of the building!"

Silence.

"I see," Bobby said, keeping his voice neutral.

"Me too," Logan agreed. "No, really. Did you guys forget that there's a learning curve when you start interrogating with a new partner? Eames," he went on, "you don't know how much mileage Barek gets out of being totally direct with people. She's used to working with me, and let me tell you - shit people wouldn't take from me in a million years, they look at her and all her girly hair and stuff and lap it up." He glanced at his partner, who was watching him with one eyebrow raised, and cleared his throat. "Uh, I mean, all her _charm_. Not her hair." Another look at Barek, who still didn't look pleased, and he tried one more time. "Uh, her ability to project a friendly persona, in complete contrast to how much of an asshole I can be?" The eyebrow went down then and he let out a sigh of relief. "So, you know, it's not that she was trying to do anything weird. She just, uh, probably didn't realize that she can't play off you like she plays off me."

"Hmm," Alex murmured noncommittally, not willing to admit defeat so easily.

Bobby glanced at her worriedly, then looked at Logan and nodded his agreement. "Eames is used to keeping things prioritized when I try to go off on tangents. I'm used to it. Barek, you're - obviously - not. It's just a . . . a flow you have to get used to."

Alex looked up at him in surprise. "You never told me you had my style all analyzed."

"You think you've got it bad?" Barek countered from the other side of the table. She turned to glare at Logan as she pointedly went on, "At least _your _partner doesn't think it's your _hair_ that makes you a good interviewer!"

Logan, looking guilty, coughed.

"I guess it makes sense that you'd be used to being really direct, if you have to get people to forget about the big scary-looking guy and start talking about the important stuff," Eames allowed grudgingly.

"_He's _big and scary-looking?" Bobby asked, looking offended at the implication that he wasn't.

"You're big, Bobby," she told him, giving him a teasing pat on the cheek, "but you have to admit, most of the time you're not scary."

"Hmph."

"He does tend to kind of wander off topic," Barek said thoughtfully, "doesn't he. Huh, I guess maybe I can see why you'd be used to steering the interview."

"Aha!" Logan said excitedly. "I think we've got a truce here. _She _understands _her_," he said, pointing first at Barek and then at Eames, "and _she _understands _her_," - he reversed the pointing order - "and _I _understand _my _partner, and _you_," he finished grandly, pointing a finger at Goren, "understand _your _partner!"

Alex blinked, then looked from Goren to Barek and asked, "Does either of you have a clue what he just said?"

"I think," Bobby said, smirking, "it could be roughly translated as, 'Good, no one's going to kill anyone. It's time for lunch!'"

"Why Mike," Barek teased, grinning up at her partner, "I had no idea you could be so succinct and still use so many words."

He poked her playfully in the side. "Watch it, woman. Don't mess with me when I'm hungry."

"I," she retorted, poking him back, "will mess with you whenever I want. And you'll like it, too!"

Goren and Eames looked at each other. Bobby, who was enjoying seeing Logan be shown up, shrugged halfheartedly.

Realizing that he wasn't going to stop the show, Alex sighed and walked over to where the other two detectives stood. Clapping one hand on Logan's shoulder and the other on Barek's, she pushed them apart and announced loudly, "I'm feeling like Thai today! Mike, why don't you go grab the menu from my desk."

Logan gave her a sour look, then rolled his eyes and headed for the door, muttering darkly about women and their food cravings.

Alex watched him go, then gave her partner a smug smile. "I _told_ you this wouldn't take a long time."


	17. Sister Margaret

A/N: Well, the ayes have it! Piles of you reviewed begging and/or threatening my life and/or your own mental health for me to continue the story. And who am I to disappoint my, uh . . . hmm, I was going to say "fans," but that would be really snotty, wouldn't it. Uh . . . my readers. Yeah, that works. Who am I to disappoint my readers:)

A/N (the second): I've got an idea for another casefile (in the canon world, not in this AU), but I'm trying to make myself hold off on starting it until I finish this so I don't have an excuse to procrastinate on White Hat chapters

* * *

"So let me get this straight," Logan mumbled through a mouthful of noodles an hour later. "This 'sandcastle' guy's got a motive to kill the kid no one disliked, except we don't know who the hell he is because our only witness doesn't even know where he lives, let alone his name. Or even if it's a 'he' in the first place. And we _still _haven't found anybody who might have killed the kid that practically everyone hated?" 

"SandKing," Barek corrected. "And swallow before you talk next time, unless you're going to start mooing to entertain us."

Goren snorted a laugh at that and promptly started coughing as he felt the bite of food he'd just taken go down the wrong pipe.

"It's not quite as bad as that," Eames said to Logan, casually reaching out and giving her partner a whack on the back as she spoke. "Brooks thinks SandKing grew up with Jeremy. That narrows down the search significantly, even if he's moved since then or something."

"Mmph!" Barek mumbled through a mouthful of rice, holding out a hand excitedly. She swallowed, cleared her throat, and said, "Mike, do we have Aaron's file in here?"

He blinked. "Uh, yeah. Here," he said, handing her the file that had been lying under his arm. "You thought of something?"

"Alex?" she said, ignoring him and looking at the other woman. "Do you remember the high school that was listed for your guy?"

"Mary Help," Bobby answered before Alex could even open her mouth. "In Queens. Why? Where did Weiss go?"

There was silence for a second as Barek opened the folder and scanned its contents, and then she looked up and grinned. "Mary Help. Who wants to go on a road trip?"

"To Queens?" Alex said, grimacing. "Count me out, thanks. Let me know when you find something that gives us an excuse to go to Hawaii."

"Boys?" Barek tried again, looking from one man to the other. "Any takers, or am I going this alone?"

"Sorry," Bobby said, shaking his head. "Eames and I have got stuff to do. And someone's going to have to be here to update the captain."

She moved her eyes to Logan, who shrugged elaborately. "Yeah, sure. I got nothing better to do."

Sighing, Eames rolled her eyes at Barek. "With lines like that, I don't know how you keep the hordes of women away from him."

"I carry a gun," Carolyn said simply as she stood up. "You figure it out."

Logan raised his eyebrows at her nonchalant tone. When she just smiled back placidly, he heaved a girlish sigh, put a wrist against his forehead, and breathed, "My hero!"

"Oh, enough," Eames groaned, giving Barek a shove. "Get out of here, you two."

"Yes ma'am." Logan took Barek's arm, remembered her earlier threat, and quickly dropped it again in favor of just nodding toward the door. "Shall we?"

Barek nodded, smirking. "Let's see if the nuns can whip you into shape."

* * *

"Jeremy Carter?" asked the wimpled woman as she led Logan and Barek into the principal's office at Mary Help of Christians School. "My goodness, yes, I remember him. Oh, and I'm Sister Margaret," she added as she sat down at her desk, waving a hand toward the name plaque that was precariously balanced between a stack of folders and the edge of the desk. "I'm sorry; my secretary didn't give me your names." 

"Detectives Barek and Logan," Barek supplied without looking up from the notebook she was opening. "Why do you remember Jeremy, Sister?"

Surprised by the lack of niceties, the nun looked from Barek, who was still concentrating on writing something, to Logan, who offered her an apologetic smile and a slight shrug. She sighed. "Jeremy was one of the students we in the administration knew because we never had to see him."

"So then he was a good kid, huh?" Logan asked, amusing himself by trying out his most winning smile on the nun. He hadn't had a chance to do that since he was in eighth grade and called Sister Mary Joseph a penguin. He'd gotten a ruler across the knuckles in retaliation for that, but he'd charmed his way out of being sent to the principal's office, although he'd had a sore hand for a week afterward. He wondered how hard it would be to bring today's nun to heel.

"He was very likeable, yes," Sister Margaret agreed with a slight inclination of her head, apparently unmoved by his charm. "I can only think of one instance of him getting in trouble in all four years he spent here."

That caught Barek's attention. Slipping her pen behind her ear, she looked up at the older woman. "When did that once happen, and did anyone else get in trouble with him?"

Sister Margaret gave her a mildly reproachful look, as if she was tempted to tell her that such brusqueness was not tolerated in the school. "I believe it had something to do with computers. If you'll give me a moment, I can check," she added, reaching for her computer mouse. "Let's see here . . ."

The nun, appearing to be absorbed in searching the computer's records, fell silent, and Logan took that opportunity to elbow his partner lightly and give her an inquisitive look. When she just gave him a bright smile, he leaned awkwardly over the arms of both their chairs and whispered, "I thought _I _was supposed to be the one who had a problem with authority."

"You are."

"Ah, here we go," Sister Margaret chirped, looking up from her monitor. "Jeremy and another boy were caught trying to use a computer to change Jeremy's grades his senior year."

"Only Jeremy's grades?" Logan asked as he returned his attention to the woman behind the desk, catching the oddity in her statement as only a one-time discipline problem would. "Was the other kid not worried about his report card or something?"

"The other 'kid,'" she replied disapprovingly, "was no longer a student at this school. There were no computerized grades of his to change."

Barek perked up slightly, suddenly looking thoughtful. "You said 'no longer,'" she pointed out. "Does that mean that he was, at one point, a student here?"

"Well yes, but -"

"Great!" Logan broke in, ignoring her attempt to protest. "What was his name?"

Sister Margaret closed her mouth with a snap and blinked. "I can't just release students' names willy-nilly, Detective," she told him sharply. "You asked about Jeremy, and since he's dead - god rest his soul - I'm sharing his records with you; however, the _rest _of our students still have the right to their privacy."

"Oh, of course," Barek said with a wave of her hand, automatically slipping into peacekeeping mode. "We understand that. How 'bout you just let us run something by you real quick, instead?"

"I suppose that would be alright," the nun acknowledged reluctantly, looking like she knew their dropping of the question had been done too quickly to mean anything good.

"Thanks, Sister," Logan said, trying out his patented smile one more time. Leaning forward in his chair confidingly, he went on, "See, we're also on a case dealing with a kid named Aaron Weiss, and since he went here . . ." He let his voice trail off and shrugged, letting her draw her own inferences about their motivation.

"Aaron Weiss?" Sister Margaret repeated blankly, clearly trying to place the name. "Oh, you must mean Sandy Weiss."

The detectives exchanged a look that contained both confusion at the unknown name and excitement at the mention of something related to sand. "Uh, no ma'am," Barek finally said politely, turning back to the nun. "The name we have is 'Aaron,' not 'Sandy'."

"Yes, well, he never took well to being called Sandy," she replied with the look of someone who heard that complaint a thousand times. "I imagine he switched to his middle name once he was out of school."

"His middle name?" Barek prompted, pulling her pen out from behind her ear.

"Yes. His full name is Sanford Aaron Weiss," Sister Margaret said distractedly, her attention clearly having moved on to other matters, such as: "What has Sandy done now, Detective?"

"Now?" Logan echoed, raising his eyebrows.

She nodded. "Sanford liked to think he was . . . I believe he called it 'anti-establishment.' Which, as far as I could tell, was the same as 'disobedient.' Since you're asking about him, I assume he hasn't changed his ways."

When Logan fell silent in response to that, Barek began to watch her partner out of the corner of her eye, waiting for the cue she suspected was going to come as she pretended to concentrate on her notes. After a few seconds, Logan leaned back in his chair and shifted his weight slightly as though he was relaxing, and, right on cue, Barek looked up and said to Sister Margaret in her most dry, matter-of-fact tone, "Oh, he's undergone the ultimate change, Sister. He's dead."

A beat of complete silence.

"I . . . beg your pardon?" Sister Margaret gasped, putting a shocked hand to her chest.

Hiding a smirk, Barek returned her attention to her pen, leaving her partner to fill in the blanks for the nun.

Logan, who was somewhat off-balance from Barek's abrupt role-change, made a mental note to question her about it later and then smiled apologetically at Sister Margaret. "Aaron's dead, ma'am," he said, echoing Barek's words just for good measure. "He and Jeremy died a week apart, and their deaths might be connected. Now . . . would you like to tell us who it was that Jeremy got in trouble with, that one time he got in trouble?"

Still speechless, she nodded vaguely and turned the computer monitor toward them.

"Jeremy Carter was caught with . . . Sanford Weiss," he read off the discipline report that was showing on the screen. "Well, how do ya like that."

"Aaron - Sandy - whatever you want to call him -" Barek said, looking past the monitor to the woman behind it, "wasn't he much older than Jeremy?"

"Older, yes. Three. . . maybe four years. I believe they knew each other before they came here, however - they were neighbors, or their parents knew each other, or something along those lines."

"Ok, so let me see if I've got everything straight," Barek said, pushing her pen into her hair again and lifting her notepad off her lap so she could read what she'd written. "The boy who we know as Aaron Weiss was born Sanford Aaron Weiss, and he and Jeremy were friends during high school, if not even earlier?"

"That is correct."

"And they were caught once trying to hack into the computer system."

"Yes."

"Was Jeremy punished?"

"Yes," Sister Margaret said again, nodding. "He received a day's in-school suspension. We chose not to punish him too harshly, since it was his first infraction."

Barek glanced at her partner and then, for the first time since they had entered the room, smiled widely at the woman they were interviewing. "This is very useful information, Sister. We appreciate your help."

Sister Margaret stared at the smile.

Logan, only by virtue of his being used to his partner's sea changes of mood, managed not to, and just nodded encouragingly at the nun as he and Barek stood up. "Yeah, thank you, Sister. Here's our card. Please call if you think of any other information."

"I . . . yes," the woman stuttered, obviously captivated by Barek's sudden change of attitude. "Of course. Thank you."

"Mmm." Favoring the nun with one last nod, Barek turned and headed toward the door, her partner trailing behind her. "Don't worry, we can find our own way out," she called over her shoulder to the perplexed nun.


	18. A homecooked dinner

A/N: You ask for fluff, you get fluff!

* * *

"What's with the the nun-hostitility?" 

Barek pulled the car door closed behind her, buckled her seatbelt, and turned to look at him. "Pardon?"

He shrugged. "She seemed like a nice enough old bird."

"Drive," she ordered, waving a hand at the steering wheel. "What makes you think I didn't like her?"

"You mean besides the sudden attitude problem you developed when you saw her?" he asked as he started the car. "Gee, I don't know. Maybe the way you refused to look at her for three-quarters of the interview?"

Slouching down in her seat, she gave him an incredulous look. "You actually have to ask me this? I thought you went to Catholic school."

"I did. What's that got to do with it?"

"And you don't harbor any resentment for the nuns? Are you trying to tell me they didn't beat the hell out of you?"

"Oh, is that all?" he said easily. "Yeah, I got whacked with the ruler pretty regularly. But the nuns were mostly sweethearts when they weren't wielding weapons. You didn't answer my question - why don't you like them?"

"I should have known," she snorted. "Of course they'd all love you, Mr. Slick."

"Do I detect a hint of bitterness?" he teased, taking his eyes off the road long enough to grin irreverently at her. "What gives? I thought you went to public school."

"I did," she muttered. "_After _they labeled me incorrigible and kicked me out of Catholic school."

Logan's eyebrows shot up. "You -"

"I'm going to call in," she said a little too loudly, reaching down to unclip her phone from her belt. "Goren and Eames need to hear about this interview, and it's his turn to feed us all dinner, anyway."

Vaguely amused by her avoidance of the issue, he just nodded, then thought for a second and gave her a mildly offended look. "Wait, you're going to eat something he cooks? You won't eat anything _I _cook!"

Catching the hint of jealousy in his voice, she smirked and patted his arm. "Yeah, well, according to Alex, _he _is capable of cooking dinner without setting the kitchen on fire. Unlike _some _-"

"Yeah, yeah," he grumbled. "I get the picture. Make your call."

She moved her hand from his arm to his leg, giving his thigh a comforting pat that lasted a second too long to be just comforting. "Yes, dear."

"Hmph."

* * *

"Hey!" Bobby chuckled, attempting to sound annoyed, as he lifted Alex's hand off his side and pressed it down on the counter. "Aren't you the one who ordered me to leave you alone and go clean your bedroom when we did this at your place?"

"Double standard," she announced cheerfully, giving him a shameless grin as she reclaimed her hand and slipped it under the tail of his shirt.

Bobby made another halfhearted attempt to shake her off, then put down the knife he'd been using and, without warning, twisted around and grabbed her hand before she could pull it back. "A double standard?"

"Yeah." Instead of trying to get away from him, she used his hold on her hand to brace herself as she went up on her toes to kiss him. "You and Mike had way too much fun today at me and Barek's expense. You burned your daily get-out-of-jail free card."

"Oh yeah?" he challenged with a smirk. "What are you going to do, beat me up?"

She gave him a playful push toward the counter. "Maybe. Would you have a problem with it if I did?"

Grinning, he grabbed her hand again and raised it to his lips, kissing her knuckles lightly. "I doubt it." A pause as he sniffed at her skin. "You smell like tomato."

Alex burst out laughing. "That's because you've had me arranging tomatoes for the past half hour, genius." She snagged his hand in retaliation and made a show of smelling it. "You smell like basil. What do you say to that, huh?"

"Hmm," he murmured, nodding thoughtfully as he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her closer. "I say . . . we'd make a pretty good start for a bruschetta."

With a roll of her eyes, she used her free hand to lightly smack him on the arm. "I'm not even going to try to figure out what you mean by that."

"Io ti voglio."

"That's not what it meant. And not right now, you better not 'voglio' me," she said teasingly, pulling away and heading for the oven to check the pizzas that were in it. "Unless you want them making fun of us as much as we made fun of them when we caught them half-dressed."

He opened his mouth to respond, then closed it as he realized that there was something wrong with her statement. Lunging forward, he grabbed her around the waist. "Hey, wait a second! You don't speak Italian!"

"No," she said with a smirk, "but I speak Goren. You've used that one before."

Bobby blinked. "I have?"

"Yeah. And 'te quiero,' and 'je t'aime,'" she added, ticking them off on her fingers as she went, "and 'Ich liebe Dich' . . ."

"Ok, ok," he laughed, pulling her back to his side of the kitchen. "I get the picture."

"Good." She reached up to pat his cheek, smiled, and wiggled out of his arms again. "The pizza's going to burn if I don't get it out of the oven."

"They won't care what they're eating. They're probably fighting by now anyway."

"Bobby! Be nice."

"That's not nearly as much fun."

Before she could respond to that, there was a knock on the apartment door. "See?" she told him with a smug smile as she headed out of the kitchen. "We're both fully clothed and there's nothing incriminating going on."

She could have sworn she heard him grumble something that sounded like _too bad _just before she touched the doorknob, and as she pulled the door open, she looked over her shoulder and stuck her tongue out at him.

"Now that's my idea of a greeting!" announced Logan as he stepped into the apartment, leering playfully at her and her still-showing tongue.

Barek gave him a backhanded whack on the chest. "Behave, you. If you get us kicked out before we eat, I'm going to kill you."

"Ow!" he yelped, clutching his chest as dramatically as if she'd shot him instead of hit him. "Jeez, what did I say about you being all hostile today?"

"I'm not hostile," she retorted, pulling his hand away from his fake injury and forcing it down to his side, "just hungry. Do I smell pizza, Alex?"

Alex, who had been enjoying watching Barek beat up on her partner, blinked. "Oh, uh, yeah. Homemade."

Carolyn dropped Logan's hand and stared at Alex. "You're kidding me."

"No. Why would I be kidding you?"

"Not only does he cook, but he cooks _pizza_?"

Smirking at the dark look Logan was giving his partner in response to her astonishment, Alex nodded and said airily, "Oh, yeah. He's good to have in the kitchen."

"Don't encourage her," Logan groaned, giving Alex's shoulder a light push and then leaning over to stage-whisper in her ear, "She almost beat up a nun today - don't think she won't do it to me or you, too."

A throat cleared loudly from the kitchen doorway and all three of them looked up to find Goren, dishtowel in hand, scowling at the hand that Logan still had on Alex's shoulder.

"Oh, chill," she chided with a roll of her eyes. "Barek's considering dropping Logan for you now that she knows you can cook. Someone's got to keep the poor guy's self-confidence up."

That earned her two glares and a smirk. Logan, the owner of the smirk, glanced at Goren, shrugged slightly, and slipped an arm around Alex. "At least I'm going to get _some _female companionsh- ow!" He turned to frown at his partner, who had just kicked him in the shin. "What was that for?"

"I believe," Alex said delicately, shifting his arm off her, "that was her way of telling you to get your hands off the already-sold merchandise."

Barek burst out laughing and looked over her shoulder at Bobby, who just smiled slightly and shook his head, indicating that the 'merchandise' quote hadn't come from him. "You could put it like that," she said, turning back to Alex. "Or you could just get straight to the point and say that if he keeps it up, he's spending the night here with you - andGoren - and not with me."

"I don't think so," Alex muttered. Then, pasting on a bright smile, she clapped her hands like a kindergarten teacher trying to gather her charges and turned to her partner. "Bobby, is the pizza done?"

He blinked, looked back into the kitchen, and nodded. "Uh, yeah."

"Good. Let's eat before we blow that 'no one's going to kill anyone' thing to hell."

* * *

Post-note: My Italian is rusty and my German is nonexistant, so please let me know if I screwed either of them up 


	19. Prove it

"You seriously cooked this?" Logan asked half an hour later, saluting Bobby with the slice of pizza he was holding.

"Uh, yeah."

"He had help," Alex spoke up, elbowing her partner. "He'd have burned them to a crisp if I wasn't paying attention."

"Oh?" Logan asked with sudden interest, putting down his pizza. "And what was it that he was distracted by, might I ask?"

She glared at him for a second, then flipped him off and returned her attention to her own dinner.

"Is anyone interested in hearing what we got from the school?" Barek asked after a few seconds of silence. "Or are we just going to poke fun at each other all night?"

Sighing, Logan shook his head and shot Goren and Eames a persecuted look. "Here we go again. Sure, Car - why don't you tell us what we found?"

"Eat me," she responded almost automatically before turning to the other two detectives. "Not only did Jeremy and Aaron go to the same school, but they were bosom buddies while they were there."

Alex froze with her pizza halfway to her mouth. "You're kidding me."

"Swear on my mother's grave," Barek said with a shake of her head. "Right, Mike?"

He smirked. "Your mother's still alive, Barek. That's a hell of a thing to swear."

With a growl of annoyance, she elbowed him hard, knocking him into Bobby, who was sitting on his other side. "Would you at least _attempt _to get your mind back on the case, jackass?"

"Yeah, yeah, fine," he mumbled, righting himself in his chair. "She's not kidding, Alex. That's what the principal said. They even got caught messing with computers together once."

"This . . . changes things," Goren said, looking pensive as he took another bite of pizza. "If Jeremy and SandKing were close, and SandKing is actually Aaron Weiss, who got killed too . . ."

". . . then there goes our one and only motive," Alex finished for him. "Well, hell."

Barek hastily swallowed a mouthful of pizza. "You know, I don't think that's necessarily true."

"Meaning . . . what?" her partner asked her with raised eyebrows. "You think he rose from the dead to kill the Carter kid?"

"Not quite." Becoming more absorbed in her idea, she put down her pizza and sat up straighter. "Look, guys, we've got two different causes of death here - one guy shot, one guy strangled. We've been overlooking that because it seemed so obvious that the deaths _have _to be connected, but what if it means exactly what it usually means?"

"That there were two killers?" Eames supplied skeptically. "Hmm."

"No, really. Think about this: Jeremy was really concerned with security. His friend told us that he would have tried to do something to stop the virus being released. What if he _did _do something?"

" 'Something,'" Bobby said, "such as killing his friend over it? I don't know, Barek. You've got a point about the MOs, but that seems a little . . . out of character for the Jeremy Carter we've heard about from people."

"_Except_," Alex spoke up energetically, waving a hand at him, "that Aaron wasn't his friend anymore, remember?"

"Right," Carolyn said, nodding. "According to Gary Brooks, Jeremy had decided that SandKing - aka Aaron - wasn't the type of person he wanted to hang out with. If he'd decided that Aaron was basically just a son of a bitch, and if that virus is as bad as people say it is . . . he might have done what he thought he had to do."

"Which is all well and good," Logan pointed out, leaning back and crossing his arms, "except that it doesn't explain how Jeremy just happened to go and get himself killed by . . . what, a robber or something? . . . the same week he shot Aaron."

It was a good point, and silence blanketed the room as everyone returned to their pizza, trying to think around the corner that Jeremy Carter's death presented.

"Ok, wait a second," Alex said slowly, setting down her pizza crust on her plate. "When we got this case, we were told that Jeremy was an associate of the Net Kings, same as Aaron, right?"

"Yeah," Logan said. "So what?"

"_So_, we - or at least I - assumed that that meant he was one of the hackers. In on the bad stuff."

Barek nodded. "So did I."

"Well, think about it. If you'd heard about the virus and you desperately wanted to eliminate it, and all you knew about Jeremy and the Kings was that he was in with them . . ."

"There's no reason he wouldn't also be a target of someone going after the group," Bobby filled in. "Are you saying that Jeremy killed Aaron, and some other person trying to stop the virus killed Jeremy?"

"Well, why not? It fits the facts better that what we've been doing up to now."

"She's right," Mike said, nodding sagely. "The different MOs . . . the week in between . . . the screwed-up relationship between the two victims . . . they're all consistent with there being two separate murders and two separate murderers."

"But then who the hell killed the good guy?" Barek demanded, exasperated. "I mean, you're not going to go wrap your hands around the kid's neck without at least _asking _him for the program, and once he explained things . . . I mean, it just seems . . . self-defeating to kill a guy who would have liked nothing better than to work with you to get the damn thing off the market."

"Yeah, well," Logan said with a snort, "not everyone's as brilliant as you are. A guy gets pissed enough, there's a good chance he's going to stop listening."

"Oh, that's a shocker," Alex said dryly, rolling her eyes at Carolyn, who grinned in response. "What I want to know is, who is this mysterious guy who wants the virus off the streets so much that he's willing to kill for it?"

Bobby shrugged. "I can't think of anyone. Maybe we need to go back making up a roster of the club. There's always a chance there was another defector besides Carter."

"That's going to be a bitch to put together," Logan observed. "Talk about phone tag - and computer tag!"

"Ugh," Barek groaned, flopping back in her chair. "You're right. Why is it that every time we think we're getting somewhere, we hit a wall we can't break through until the next morning, when all the offices and stuff are actually _open_?"

"Life's a bitch, sweetheart," Logan said, putting an arm around her shoulders and giving her a teasing squeeze.

"You know, you can be such a _jerk_ sometimes."

"I try. Someone's got to keep you on your toes." He paused, clearing his throat. "So, uh . . . are we done here, then?"

That earned him a smack in the arm and a threatening "Mike!" from his partner, as well as a laugh from Alex. Grinning at Barek, she wiggled her eyebrows. "Yeah, I think we're done here. But Carolyn - you better be careful he doesn't keep you up all night, if we're going hacker hunting in the morning."

Logan snorted and pointed one finger at her and one finger at Goren as he and Barek stood. "If you're not worried about that for yourself too, Eames, then maybe you should think about trading up."

Alex threw her pizza crust at him.

* * *

"Man," Alex said as she shut the apartment door behind Logan and Barek, "have we ever been _that_ obvious?"

"Well, they trust us," Bobby pointed out, wrapping his arms around her from behind. "They're not like that at work or anything."

"True," she acknowledged, turning to put her arms around his neck, "but I mean . . . well, that's just not something we'd do."

Without releasing her, he leaned back slightly so he could see her face. "You sound a little disappointed by that."

"Nah. You and me both know I'd kill you if you started treating me like Logan treats her."

"Hmm." Moving his hands up to her face, he kissed her and then released her and turned toward the bedroom. "He doesn't treat her badly."

"Excuse me?" she exclaimed, scrambling to catch up with him. "You amuse yourself at least once a day by telling him he doesn't know how to treat her. Why the change of heart?" When he just looked at her and smiled, she grabbed for the tail of his shirt, trying to pull him to a stop. "Hey, answer me, you!"

He started to unbutton his shirt, still dragging her along behind him. "Make me."

"Bobby!" Out of patience, she let go of his shirt and jumped up to hook an arm around his neck from behind, which left her feet dangling a few inches above the ground. "Come on, answer my question," she wheedled, doing her best to use her body weight to pull him backwards.

Laughing, Bobby wrapped his hands around her forearm and leaned forward, making a token effort to pull her off. "Ok, ok. Uncle!"

Grinning, she loosened her grip and let herself fall back to the ground. "So talk."

"Patience, Eames," he teased, turning around and reaching for the hem of her shirt. "You've got all night to question me."

"Damn it, Bobby," she mumbled into her shirt as she allowed him to tug it off over her head. "Now you're just doing this to piss me off."

"Pissing you off is not what I had in mind." Automatically folding the t-shirt as it came off her, he set it down on a chair. "I just like to drive him nuts, and telling him how to deal with Barek is one sure way to do it."

She stared at him for a second, then shook her head and reached out to finish the buttons on his shirt. "You're kidding."

"No. His style . . ." He shrugged, watching her hands as they worked. "It wouldn't work on you. Like you said, you'd probably just kill him. But it's fine for Barek, because she doesn't mind hitting back when he's a jerk. Actually, I think she enjoys it."

"What, and I don't like hitting back?" she challenged, pushing the shirt off his shoulders, a movement which brought her within breathing distance again.

"At him?" he said thoughtfully, holding his ground as she moved closer. "You like it now, but that's because you don't have to deal with him constantly. Think about it, Alex - would you really want someone trying to snatch all the sarcasm opportunities away from you?"

"Ok, you have a point there." She paused to plant a kiss in the center of his chest. "You make a good straight man."

"As opposed to a gay man?"

"Oh, har har," she replied dryly, giving him an abrupt shove back onto the bed.

Bobby went over with a minimum of resistance and, with a slight smile, crossed his hands behind his head as he looked up at her. "What was that for?"

"For making such a bad joke," she announced archly, moving to the edge of the bed to take advantage of this rare opportunity to tower over him. "If there's one thing I'm sure you're not, it's 'gay'."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah."

He gave her a lazy grin and nudged her with one knee. "Prove it."

* * *

"That was quite possibly the most obvious exit you've ever made," Carolyn said, elbowing Mike as she followed him out of Bobby's building. "You think they couldn't figure out what you were thinking?"

He looked at her with exaggerated innocence. "What makes you think I was thinking anything except that I was ready to leave?"

"Oh, come on. It was obvious! Alex saw it all over your face, that's why she made that joke."

"Ahh," he said with a smirk as he unlocked the car. "So you're theorizing that I just want to get you in bed?"

That gave her a second's pause. "Don't you?"

"Well, I'm never one to turn down an opportunity, so you know I'm not going to say no to that."

"But that's not why you wanted to leave?" she persisted as she climbed into the car. "Then why?"

Giving her a mysterious smile, he took his time starting the car and shifting into drive, then said vaguely, "Oh, sorry. Did you ask me something?"

"Mike!"

He ducked the swat she was directing at him, then pulled into traffic. "You're so easy to piss off, you know that? No challenge anymore."

"Yeah? Well, if you don't start answering my questions, I'll show you a 'challenge' you're not gonna forget."

"Oh, fine," he sighed, shooting her a quick grin. "Bed is always a nice goal, but right now I want to hear about your delinquent Catholic school past."

"You got us out of there for _that_? So you could start bugging me about nuns again?"

"Not really about the nuns. I just want to know what you did that got you kicked out. Professional curiosity, you know? As someone who's always trying to perfect his ability to be infuriating, I'm interested in this stuff."

Barek snorted. "Figures. I should have known you were just trying to get material. What makes you think I'm going to actually tell you and give you any more ammunition against me, though?"

"My boyish charm?"

"I think not."

"My manly vigor?"

"No. _Whatever_ it is that means . . . no."

He stole another look at her. "A promise to take you out to breakfast?"

"_Now _you're talking. It better be a good breakfast, though. You take me to Joe's Diner or something, you're sleeping alone for the next week."

"Scout's honor," he said gravely, holding up his fingers in the Boy Scout salute.

"You really, really want to know?"

"Hell yeah."

"And you're not going to laugh at me?"

"Uh . . ." He cleared his throat. "Probably not. I mean, uh, I'll try not to."

"Oh, that's reassuring," she scoffed, leaning forward in her seat so she could see his face.

"Hey, I'm not going to make a promise I'm not sure I can keep."

Not wanting to acknowledge that he had a point, she sighed loudly. "Oh, fine. I taught half my class the Lord's Prayer in Yiddish and we all recited it like that in the middle of mass. For some reason, the nuns didn't appreciate that."

Logan chuckled. "Good to see that you put all those language skills toward good instead of evil. But that seems more like just a prank than something serious. They really kicked you out for it?"

"Well, no. That was just the 'first strike,' as Sister Maria put it."

"You're kidding me." When she didn't respond, he stole a glance at her, taking in her scowl. "Ok, you're not kidding me. What else did you do?"

"I, uh . . ." She coughed self-consciously. "When she called me up in front of the class to yell at me about it, I reminded her that Vatican II called for mass to be said in the local language and told her she must not have been paying attention that year."

He turned the car onto his street, chuckling. "That's -"

"And then I cursed her out. In Polish."

"_What_?"

"Hey, it's not like she understood it!" she said defensively. "She just _assumed _that I was saying rude things."

"Well, weren't you?" he asked, trying to keep his attention on parking the car and not burst out laughing again.

"Hmph. Maybe I was, but it just came out! It wasn't like I _meant _to call her a _kurwa_. I don't think I even knew what it meant back then. I was just used to hearing my dad say stuff like that when he got pissed, and . . ." She broke off as Logan pulled clumsily into a parking spot, slammed on the brakes, and laid his head on the steering wheel, laughing. "It's not funny!"

Making a visible effort to regain his self-control, he looked up at her and promptly burst out laughing again. "Well, I have no idea what a 'koor-va' is, but I sure think it's funny as hell!" He paused, swallowed, and tried again to stop laughing. "Uh . . . what _is _a kurwa?"

"Shut up," she snapped, unbuckling her seat belt and climbing out of the car.

He followed suit, trotting after her as she headed for the door of his building. "Come on, tell me!"

"_Spierdalaj_!"

"Oh, come on Car, that's not fair! If you're going to yell at me, do it in a language I can understand!"

"Fine." One hand on the door, she turned to give him a sweet smile as she translated, " 'Fuck off'."

"Thank you." Unperturbed, he pressed on. "What's a kurwa?"

Sighing, she rolled her eyes and preceded him through the door as he unlocked it. "A whore, among other things."

"Hah!" Wrapping an arm around her as they stepped into the elevator, he gave her an exuberant hug. "I knew there was a reason I liked you. You've got to teach me some of those."

Unable to help herself, she cracked a smile as he led her toward his apartment. "Maybe, if you ask nicely. Or if you're . . . very persuasive."

"Oh, persuasion is one of my strong suits, honey."

"Yeah?" she teased, slipping behind him as he worked on the locks on his apartment door. "We'll just see about that, won't we."

In one smooth motion, he pushed the door open, hooked an arm around her waist, and pulled her inside, where he used the arm to hold her still while he closed and re-locked the door. "Yeah, I guess we will. So, about that whole me wanting to get you in bed thing . . .?"

Grinning, she grabbed his hand and pulled him deeper into the apartment. "_Chodżmy do łóżka_, Logan. You can do your worst to me in there."

* * *

A/N: My Polish is only slightly less nonexistent than my German. Corrections welcome. 


	20. Al Brown

"Morning," Alex mumbled through a yawn, half-waving at Barek as she went past her desk the next morning.

"Morning. You look like you could use another few hours of sleep."

"Don't tempt me. Is there coffee?"

"Beats me." Pointing to the Starbucks cup on her desk, Barek grinned. "I blackmailed Mike into buying me coffee on the way in."

"You had a blackmail opportunity . . . and you used it for Starbucks?" Alex said dubiously.

"No, that was after I forced him to feed me breakfast. Get this - he didn't want to go out and have to hurry, so he _cooked_. And when it comes to eggs and pancakes, he's not bad!"

Alex sighed and shook her head mournfully. "Damn, now I can't make fun of his cooking anymore. You'll have to find me new ammunition."

"Ammunition against what?" Logan asked from behind her.

Startled, she spun around to face him. "Mike! Since when do you walk so quietly?"

"Since I can tell you two are talking about me," he replied with a smirk, toasting her with his own Starbucks cup. "So, which of my numerous lovable qualities are you discussing this morning?"

"You have lovable qualities?" Alex said, widening her eyes and pretending to be shocked by the concept.

Logan just shook his head at her and sat down at his desk. "You girls got a plan for tracking down this unknown hacker-defector? Or are we just going to spend the day cold-calling - or whatever you call it when it's on computers?"

The two women looked at each other and shrugged. "Uh . . ." Alex said after a second, "I was thinking you guys could talk to Gary Brooks again. If he knew that Jeremy was friends with SandKing, he can probably give us the names of some other friends of his."

"Fair enough," he acknowledged with a nod. "We can do that. What about you and Goren?"

As if on cue, Goren appeared beside his partner. "Eames, I - did someone say my name?"

"Yeah," Logan said, nodding a hello. "I was asking Eames what you guys are going to do while me and Carolyn re-interview Gary Brooks."

Alex, tapped out of ideas, looked up at Goren and waited to see if he had any suggestions.

He considered that for a few seconds. "Carter worked in a security group, right?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"Well, if we're looking for anti-virus sorts of people, that's probably as good a place to start as anywhere else."

"Hey, score one for Goren!" Barek said, grinning. "Why didn't you think of that, Alex?"

Hit by another timely yawn, Alex could only shrug for a few seconds before she crossed her arms in front of her, cocked an eyebrow, and said with a half-smile, "I'm still half-unconscious. I didn't get much sleep last night.."

Barek burst out laughing; Logan let out a quiet wolf-whistle. "Good to see you took my advice to heart, kid."

Alex was opening her mouth to respond to that when Barek suddenly sat up a little straighter and hissed, "Incoming."

Goren and Eames eased a step farther apart, while Logan attempted to wipe the amusement off his face before Deakins reached them. "What is _with _you four lately?" the captain demanded as he pulled to a stop beside them, taking in the looks of angelic innocence they were all affecting, with varying degrees of success. "Do I need to break out the cattle prod to get you to stop gabbing and start working?"

"Aw, it's only eight-twelve, Captain," Logan protested. "Give us a break."

"Do we still have two corpses in the morgue waiting to have their killer identified?" Deakins shot back.

"Well actually," Eames spoke up, leaning into his field of vision, "we don't. We have two corpses waiting to have their killer_s _identified. As in, plural."

"You . . . what?"

"Two MOs, two motives, two killers," Goren said shortly. "Nothing holds together if we assume they were killed by the same person."

Deakins sighed, knowing he wouldn't get anything else out of his detectives until they'd gotten a few more cups of coffee into themselves. "You _are _going to let me in on this at some point before you make an arrest, aren't you?" he asked resignedly.

"Of course."

"Sure."

"You bet."

"Uh-huh."

"Good. I'm going to hold you to that." Giving the two Starbucks cups on Barek's desk a look of jealousy masquerading as a disgust, Deakins shook his head and retreated to his office.

"You heard the man!" Eames announced, waving her arms expansively. "Get your asses over to Gary Brooks's apartment!"

"Bite me," Logan muttered, faking a punch to her arm as he stood up.

She raised an eyebrow, considering that, then snapped her teeth at him. "Don't tempt me, Mike."

Affecting a look of terror, he jumped behind Barek, doing his best to use her much-smaller frame to cover himself.

Rolling her eyes, Barek took hold of his forearm and started dragging him toward the door. "Move it, scaredy-cat."

He glanced over his shoulder to make sure that Goren and Eames weren't looking , then smirked down at his partner, ducked his head, and whispered, "Yes, dear."

The last thing Bobby and Alex heard from their friends was a high-pitched "Ow!" emanating from Logan. "Yep," Alex said, nodding in approval. "All's well at Major Case."

* * *

"Mr. Rutledge?" Eames said, knocking quietly on the doorframe of the man's office at J.T. Brown. 

In a near-perfect reenactment of his first meeting with the detectives, Rutledge jerked his head up as if her low voice had startled him. "What?" he said reflexively, then, recognizing the people in the doorway, corrected himself quickly. "I mean, uh, hi, Detectives. What's . . . you need to talk to me?"

They took a few steps into his office, Goren's eyes automatically doing another visual scan of the room as Eames told Rutledge, "Actually, we were hoping to talk to the group of people Jeremy Carter worked with. You told us he was working on a project for your Security Department, right?"

"Uh, yes. You really need to speak to Al Brown about that, though, not me. I'm not in the loop on that project."

"We were thinking the same thing," Goren told him without looking up from the plastic container of Magic Sand - _whatever that is_, Eames thought to herself - he was examining. "Can you tell us where we can find him?"

"Uh, have you checked his office?"

"No, Mr. Rutledge," Alex said patiently, trying not to notice her partner's fascination with the container of sand, lest she burst out laughing. "We don't know where his office is. That's what we were hoping you could tell us."

"Oh," Rutledge mumbled, blinking. "Uh, of course. Take a right out of here," he began, gesturing to his own office, "and follow the hallway down until you hit another cluster of cubicles. Al's office is in the front corner."

"Thanks."

* * *

"That guy needs to stop drinking so much coffee," Alex whispered to Bobby as they made their way down the hallway Rutledge had indicated. "I thought he was going to jump out of his skin when he saw us." 

"He is a little skittish," Bobby agreed, looking over his shoulder at the office they'd just left. "But then, middle management in America isn't known for being carefree."

"True. Ooh, this section's cubes are purple," she said with fake excitement as the hallway opened up into a room that was nearly identical to the one outside Rutledge's office. "I really should hire their interior designer to do my apartment."

"To do what, cover the walls in purple and blue partitions? That's not something I want to wake up to."

"What, the designer, or the partitions?" she teased. "Here, I think this is him. The name on the door is 'A. Brown'."

"The partitions. Although the designer probably isn't terribly attractive either." He paused a second there as they both attempted to transition from their joking attitudes to their investigation attitudes, then went on, "Ready?"

"Yep."

Bobby stepped forward and knocked on the doorframe of Brown's office, the same way Alex had on Rutledge's, and peered into the dim room, trying to get a look at the man inside. "Mr. Brown?"

A head popped up from beneath the desk, followed by a hand holding a bundle of multicolored wires. "Yes? Can I help you?"

Alex almost expected him to start sniffing the air and wiggling his nose. His moustache, thick eyebrows, and wire-framed glasses gave him the look of an intelligent woodland creature that belonged in a storybook, not a corporate office. "Mr. Brown, I'm Detective Eames, and this is Detective Goren. We're investigating the death of Jeremy Carter, and we . . . Mr. Brown?"

Brown had gone a shade paler, and as she watched worriedly, he staggered to his feet, revealing a heavyset body in an ill-fitting suit, and then dropped into a desk chair that had been pushed to the side. "Jeremy," he finally said slowly. "Of course."

"Mr. Brown, are you alright?" she asked cautiously.

"What? Oh, yes." With a self-conscious chuckle, he shook his head. "I have low blood pressure. Usually I remember not to stand up so fast."

Neither detective pointed out that he had paled _before _standing. "You worked closely with Jeremy, is that right?" Bobby said after a second. "We spoke to a Mr. Rutledge down the hall, and he said -"

"Yes," Brown cut him off, then looked taken aback at the sharpness in his own voice. "Yes," he tried again, moderating his tone this time. "He was on loan to me while we worked on a new firewalling system."

"Yeah," Alex said, pulling out her omnipresent notepad and flipping it open, "we were hoping you could give us a list of names of the people involved in that project."

"People in the . . ." He stared at her, aghast, as he digested the possible implications of her request. "You don't think someone _here _did this, do you?"

"Quite frankly, sir, we don't know," Bobby said evenly. "Can you give us a list?"

"I . . . I mean yes, sure," Brown stammered, pulling a legal pad out of a drawer. "All you need is their names?"

"That's all we need you to write down, yes," Alex replied, "but we'd appreciate it if you could also just tell us a little about each of them while we're here. We'd like to know if Jeremy had any particular friends in the group."

"Friends," Brown echoed, wrinkling his nose and reaching up to adjust his glasses, which reinforced Alex's private image of him as Nicodemus, or perhaps Owl. "Well, everyone gets along . . . we're all friendly with each other . . ."

"But was there anyone in _particular_?" she pressed, wondering if he was just an absentminded professor type or if he was trying to avoid telling them something.

"I'm not sure I understand," Brown said slowly. "Are you looking for people he would have spent time with outside of work? Is that what you mean by 'friends'?"

The detectives exchanged incredulous looks. "Any kind of friend at all," Bobby said after a second. "We're not looking at them as suspects," he added with a dismissive laugh. "We're just trying to find people who can tell us more about Jeremy."

Brown relaxed visibly at that. "Well, the core of the group is - was - me, Jeremy, Adam Caruso, and Jesse Rickman," he told them, writing the names on the legal pad as he spoke them. "There have been other people in and out, but those are the ones who were on the project full-time."

"Adam and Jesse . . ." Alex said thoughtfully, "how old are they? Jeremy's age, your age, somewhere in between?"

"They're both young. Older than Jeremy, I mean - almost everyone was older than Jeremy - but I believe they're in their late twenties or early thirties."

"Do they work here, in this office?"

"Some days. Some days they telecommute. That's standard practice for our department."

"Are they here today?" Bobby asked, leaning back to peer out the door as if he thought he could spot the men in question. "We'd like to speak with them."

Brown grew still for a moment, then resumed writing, gripping his pen tighter than before. "No, they're not here. Look, I really don't think either of them is going to be able to tell you anything about -"

"We'll decide that for ourselves," Bobby said shortly. "Will they be in tomorrow?"

"Uh, yes." He adjusted his glasses again, this time accompanying it with a nervous duck of his head. "They should be in by nine-thirty or so tomorrow morning. But really -"

"Thank you for your time," Alex broke in before he could get out another protest. "We'll be in to speak to them tomorrow, if you wouldn't mind letting them know." Pausing, she stole a glance at her partner, who nodded slightly. "Thank you for your time, Mr. Brown."

"That . . . that's it?" he asked as he handed her the list he'd written.

"For now." She handed him a card - or, rather, she put it on his desk when he didn't appear to notice that she was holding it out to him - and, trying not to laugh, stole another look at his quivering mustache. "We'll see you tomorrow morning, sir."

They had hardly gotten out the door before Alex grabbed her partner's arm and broke down in silent laughter, earning herself a look of alarmed amusement from him. "What's so funny?"

Trying to get herself under control, she just shook her head. "I'll tell you when we get in the car."

* * *

A/N: For those who couldn't place the names, Nicodemus is from "The Rats of NIHM" and Owl is from Winnie the Pooh 


	21. King Leer

A/N: Ok, well, I know it isn't much, but considering how long it's been since I looked at this story, at least it's a start at picking it back up. I know some of you are still out there, hoping I finish this, so here's to my hoping right along with you. Enjoy this short chap :)

* * *

"Ok, we're in the car. What's so funny?" Bobby asked her a few minutes later.

"You couldn't see it?"

"See _what, _Alex?"

She snickered. "He looked like a bunny rabbit that was cornered. All twitchy snd mustache-y . . ."

He stared at her. "_That's _what had you hysterical? Geez, I thought is was something good."

"You," she announced, returning her attention to the road, "obviously haven't read enough children's books. You'd appreciate his cuteness if you had."

"Al Brown?" he asked incredulously. "Cute?"

"Bunny-rabbit cute," she clarified, glancing at him just long enough to roll her eyes at the irritation in his voice, "not go-to-bed-with cute. He's a little too . . . middle-aged for that."

"He can't be more than five or six years older than me, Eames."

Keeping her eyes forward, she grinned and patted his thigh. "You're a whole different ballgame, Bobby. You could be eighty, and you still wouldn't be middle-aged."

Catching her hand before she could pull it away, he gave it a teasing squeeze. "Thanks . . . I think."

"Oh, come on," she snorted. "Anyone who's got all his hair, is in good shape, can get by on three hours sleep a night, and has a, uh . . ." She coughed uncomfortably.

"What?" he prompted suspiciously, curious about what she had been about to say.

Unable to hold it back, she snickered. "A middle-aged guy wouldn't have been able to keep me, uh, entertained all night last night."

He had no response prepared for that, and he just blinked at her for a second before shaking his head and laughing. "Do me a favor and don't bring that up in front of Logan and Barek. Or anyone else."

"If you say so. Uh, while we're sort of on the topic, you want to call them and see if they got anything from Brooks?"

He shrugged and unclipped his phone from his belt.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Barek, startled out of the note-typing she was concentrating on, slapped a hand to the phone at her waist when it started vibrating, then winced when her slap forced the hard plastic holster into her hip. "Ow! Shit . . ."

"You gonna answer that?" her partner asked, leaning around his pole and raising an eyebrow. "Or just curse at it?"

"I'm answering, I'm answering." And answer it she did, although not before taking time to mutter another of her limitless list of Polish obscenities at him first. "_Dupek _. . . hello?"

"What's a _dupek_?" asked Goren on the other end. "Have I just been insulted?"

"An asshole. I was yelling at Mike, not you. What's up?"

Goren smirked to himself. He looked forward to taking more lessons from Barek's Patented Book Of Foreign Curses. "We just finished at J.T. Brown. Albert Brown claims to know nothing, although he did give us some more names we can pursue - coworkers, I mean. Did you get anything from your guy?"

"_Jackass!_" Eames's voice interrupted before Barek could respond.

"Let me guess," Barek laughed. "You're stuck in traffic."

"Well, we're driving. She's just yelling because a cab cut her off, though. No major traffic. We're on our way back to One PP, but -"

"Yeah, I know, you wanted to check in," she interrupted. "We just got back from Harlem. Tell Eames I think he cleaned his apartment in anticipation of us this time."

Goren dutifully relayed the message, which got a grin from his partner despite her ire at the taxi in front of them.

"Anyway," Barek continued, "Like your guy, he was able to give us some more names - except he knows everybody by screen names, not real names, and if we were lucky he was able to narrow them down to a certain state. We're going to be running some records searches for the next hour or two to try to track down who we can with the information he was able to give us, but . . ." She sighed. "This sucks. I didn't quit the FBI for this to end up back riding a desk."

Across from her, Logan peered around the pole long enough to leer at her in response to that, and she could almost hear him thinking, _I can think of something else for you to ride_. Rolling her eyes, she threw a handy pen at him.

"Well, we're not going to have too exciting an afternoon, either," Goren was telling her when she started paying attention again. "How about Eames and I pick up lunch for all of us and we can be bored together while we eat?"

"Sounds like a plan. What kind of food are you thinking?"

"Soup!" Alex yelled in the background. "Hale And Hearty!"

"Soup's fine," Barek said before Goren could ask her. "But you better get a lot. I'm starving, and if _I'm _starving, I'm surprised my partner isn't gnawing on my arm yet." That earned her another leer, and this time she threw an eraser at him.

"We'll get one of each flavor," Goren assured her. "We should be there in about twenty minutes. Try not to let him gnaw on you before then."

Barek couldn't help herself. Logan's comical leering coupled with Goren's unintended innuendo sent her into a gale of laughter. "Sounds . . ." she managed to gasp into the phone, "like a . . . plan. See you then!" And before Goren could respond, she snapped the phone shut, dropped it on her desk, and glared at her partner. "_Stop _that, Mike Logan!"

"Who, me? I'm just trying to settle on which arm I'm going to pick . . ."

She slewed her eyes to the side, checking that there was no one within close earshot, then leaned forward and smiled silkily at him."You behave yourself, buddy, and you can sample them both tonight."

Logan's eyes widened. She rarely referred to their relationship in the office outside of joking in conversation with Eames. Deciding to take it as a good sign, he just grinned at her and - very subtly - licked his lips.

It got the point across. Barek's face turned a rather becoming shade of red and she made a show of staring at her laptop screen.

"Gotcha," he whispered, and settled back down to the work he had been doing.


	22. Hale & Hearty

"Gary Brooks is _pissed_," Barek reported half an hour later through a mouthful of Sweet Potato Chicken Chowder. "He's not a fan of dead ends, especially when they involve the murder of his friends." She leaned back against her desk and grinned. "I think if we'd offered, he would have come right along back here to help work the case."

"At least your guy didn't look like a cartoon character," Eames replied, putting down her own container of soup. "I thought our guy's eyes were going to bug out like a Looney Toon when we started asking him about Jeremy."

"You think he has a guilty conscience or something?" Logan asked, eyeing first his partner's soup and then the tomato-eggplant concoction she'd insisted he eat.

Eames snickered. "Are you kidding? I think he belongs in the Hundred Acre Wood, not a corporate office. And I have a hard time picturing 'Owl' committing murder."

"Owl?"

Goren looked down at his Sloppy Joe soup and groaned. "Oh, here we go again."

Intrigued now, Logan and Barek looked expectantly at Eames, who sighed and glared at her partner. "Owl. Like, from Winnie the Pooh." The detectives continued to look at her blankly. "He has this neatly-trimmed beard," she explained, exasperated, "and wire-rimmed glasses, and he just looks like -"

"Ah," Logan interrupted, nodding exaggeratedly, and took advantage of his partner's distraction by making a desperate grab for her soup, which she had set down on her desk so she could flip through some files. He shoved a spoonful of the more appetizing soup into his mouth and mumbled through it, "Christ, Carolyn, no wonder you grabbed this one. And you tried to feed me goddamn _eggplant_?"

"Eggplant's good for you, Mike. It's purple, and purple vegetables contain -"

"Purple!" he repeated, sounding persecuted. "The woman's feeding me purple vegetables! It's like she thinks I'm gay or something! What next, she'll have me watching Tinky-Winky during lunch?"

The other three detectives stared at him. "Tinky-Winky?" Goren finally ventured hesitantly, not entirely sure he wanted to know.

"Yeah, you know. The purple teletub...um..." He stopped and eyed the two women, who were trying but mostly failing to hide their laughter.

"I happen to like eggplant, actually," Goren offered, generously trying to take some of the conversational heat off his friend.

"Then _you _eat this shit!" Logan shoved the container of tomato-eggplant at him, yanking his hands away so quickly that he almost dropped it on Goren instead of handing it to him. "_Purple_," he muttered again, disgusted.

Barek cleared her throat pointedly and took her chowder back from her partner, leaving him with no soup at all. "Can we get back on topic, here? Alex was telling us about, um, Owl."

"Al Brown," Alex explained, somewhat sheepishly. "I'm sorry, he just looked _so _much like him, and -"

"She giggled for five minutes straight after we left his office," Goren threw in. "You're not going to get anything sensible out of her about this."

"Oh?" Eames said archly. "And I suppose you can explain it with perfect clarity?"

He shrugged. "At least I can boil it down to what we actually got out of him, rather than the glories of his moustache."

"Then do it, jackass."

Goren calmly turned back to Logan and Barek. "Brown was incredibly nervous to be speaking to us. I thought he might pass out at one point. On the other hand, he didn't have much to say, and it didn't seem like he was holding anything back so much as he was just hopelessly shocked by what happened. He gave us the names of the guys who worked most closely with Jeremy, but neither of them was in today, so we have to either chase them down tonight or go back tomorrow."

"That's more than we got," Barek sighed. "At least you have real, live names."

"You manage to track anybody down yet?" asked Eames, gesturing to the computer on Barek's desk, on which she assumed they had been searching out the owners of the screen names Gary Brooks had given them.

"Zilch. Zip," Logan grumbled. "Nada. Nothing. Fucking 'screen name' bullshit is -"

"A fact of life," his partner interrupted. "We're probably going to stay late tonight and try to run someone, anyone, down."

"Sounds, uh, fascinating," Alex managed, sounding entirely unconvinced by her own words. "Bobby and I were going to cut out early, actually -"

Logan directed a halfheartedly surly look at his partner and muttered pointedly, "_Lucky_."

"Since," Eames continued, ignoring him, "we know exactly where our guys are going to be come tomorrow morning and there's no pressing need to track them down tonight."

"Lucky," Logan said again. "Carolyn, are you sure we can't -"

"No, Mike."

"But we..." He glanced over his shoulder, making sure no one else was listening. "We could go out to dinner," he whispered." My treat." He paused, seeming to think of something, then added, "But_no _eggplant!"

Barek just rolled her eyes and punched him in the arm. "Jerk. You can take me out to dinner _after _we finish what we need to do, and not a minute before."

"Oh, you're no fun!"

"Mmhmm," she murmured disinterestedly. She'd heard it all before when it came to her partner's repertoire of complaints. "So you guys..." She glanced at Goren and Eames, and then at the clock. "You're really going to head out this early? It's only three. You think the captain's going to mind?"

Alex looked thoughtful, then sighed. "I know, I know. But we've got _nothing_ to chase except these two J.T. Brown guys. I guess we could stay and help you track down your hackers, but..." She shrugged. "I haven't done laundry in three weeks. Bobby's got an army of mold taking over his fridge. You know?"

"Hey, we're not going to tell on ya," Logan assured her. "Even if I _would _kill for a night off of my own like that."

"We cleaned your place a few days ago, Mike," Barek reminded him with another roll of her eyes.

"Well," he shot back, "I didn't say I would actually spend it_cleaning_!"

Eames winced theatrically and backed away a step, scraping her spoon in her empty soup container. "Bobby, I think that's our cue to leave, before they start fighting again."

Goren hastily deposited his soup on Logan's desk. "Right behind you, Eames." True, his kitchen could use a cleaning, but he was hoping to convince his partner to spend their free time on some more entertaining pursuits . . .

* * *

A/N: Another short one. I'm finding myself a lot more interested in the fluff aspect of this story than the casefile. Sigh, must find something interesting to write in... 


	23. Tracking them down

**A/N: Ok, no one have a heart attack or anything but...I think I'm going to finish this story. I've been regretting leaving it hanging, and I think I have an ending that'll work for it.** **So keep your eyes open for more chapters!**

* * *

"Hey Car?" Logan whispered around the pole that separated him from his partner an hour later.

"Hmm?"

"You got anything yet?"

"Nope. You?" she whispered back. "And why are we whispering, by the way?"

Logan shrugged and looked around the room. "It's too quiet in here. No screaming criminals or anything."

"And no screaming Goren," Barek added.

"Him, too."

"This sucks."

"I told you it would, Barek. But did you listen to me? Nooo . . ."

"Oh, shut up and go back to work."

* * *

Five hours later, Barek had finally pinned down the real name of one of the screen names they'd been given. She looked up from her computer to find her partner, chin in hand, snoozing at his desk. "Mike," she whispered, looking cautiously over her shoulder at the doors to the room, where she still expected someone to walk in any minute, even though it was way past any sane person's idea of working hours.

Logan snored gently, but didn't respond.

"Mike!" she tried again, this time accompanying it with a pencil tap on his desk top.

"Mluh," he grunted, adjusting his head position.

She lowered her tone to a more severe voice. "Logan!"

His head snapped up. "Huh?" he mumbled, blinking at her.

"You could try working instead of sleeping, you know. It might make this go a little faster."

Sighing, he looked at his watch. "It's past eight, Barek. I've accepted that we're not getting home any time tonight. I'm good with it. Can I go back to sleep now?"

"No! You may be good with it, but I'd like my own bed sometime soon. So get typing!" To punctuate this, she tossed her pencil at him, barely able to stifle a giggle when it bounced off the side of his head and he just yawned.

"Aw, come on, Car. We're never going to identify these people. They know how to keep their real-life identities separate from their online ones."

"This one didn't," she sing-songed, waving a sheet of paper in front of him.

"You found one?" For the first time since she woke him up, his eyes opened more than halfway and he looked at her with interest. "Who?"

"The one named Whoover," she replied. "He is, apparently, a Microsoft developer."

"Ok, so that means he's likely to be a programmer type. Good sign."

"In Redmond, Washington."

"That's . . . not so good."

"No," she agreed. "He can't be our culprit. I managed to get in touch with him at his office, and both he and his supervisor confirm that he hasn't made any trips away from home this week."

"Hell."

"Yep." Both detectives sighed. "I was so excited, too," Barek went on after a second. "Like, _bam_! Look at me tracking down killer geeks on their own computer turf! And then, no..."

Logan gave her a sympathetic smile. "You're still one up on me as far as that's concerned. I haven't tracked down anyone."

"Good point." She looked up at the clock, then back at him and challenged, "There's still time for you to catch up, you know."

"Oh yeah? What'll you give me if i do?"

Barek grinned. "Dinner." She paused. "And dessert."

Logan's eyes lit up and he grabbed for his copy of the list of screen names.

* * *

"Jackpot!" he yelled an hour later, startling his partner, who had given in to fatigue and was on the edge of a nap of her own.

"What?" she blurted, jerking upright and looking at him with alarm.

Grinning, he turned his monitor to show her a page of what looked like old Usenet threads and, using the mouse, highlighted a part of the sender information on one of the messages. "Check it out."

"Message from Andrea Brown, red_Rhiannon," she read off the screen. "Red_Rhiannon...that's on the list."

"You bet your ass it is," Logan said triumphantly pointing grandly at his copy of the list. "Right here. This posting . . . it's an old message. Looks like maybe it was from before she decided to go exclusively by her screen name."

She shook her head, impressed. "Nice, Mike."

"Well, hey..."

"No, seriously. Nice work - how'd you even think of searching Usenet?"

He smiled sheepishly. "I clicked the wrong button, actually. Meant to search Google, not Google Groups - which is where this came up."

"Serendipity," she replied, nodding sagely.

"Right, that too. Exactly the word I was going to use," he teased. "So, uh...this lady was posting to a newsgroup about linguistics. I don't know anything about that - could it have to do with programming?"

Barek thought about it for a second. "I think there are linguists who write programs for things like speech synthesis - where your computer talks to you," she clarified when he started to ask a question. "Like for blind people."

"Huh. So this could be good."

"Yeah, except..." She sighed. "What are the odds that a woman could have strangled Jeremy Carter? I mean, he was scrawny, but still..."

Logan just shrugged. "You could. I don't see why some other women who was reasonably strong and determined couldn't."

"Mmm. I guess we should try to track her down now."

"Well technically, yeah," he hedged, "but . . . Barek?"

"Yeah?"

"You promised me dinner, you know. If I found a real name. The actual finding the person part wasn't mentioned."

She raised an eyebrow but kept a straight face. "You're right, I did and it wasn't."

"...Well?"

Her face broke into a teasing smile. "Ok, the tracking can wait for tomorrow. Did you want dinner first...or dessert?"

* * *

"Bobby?" Alex asked, watching him neatly sort her clean socks into piles by size.

"Hmm?"

"You scare me sometimes, you know that?"

He just shrugged. "You'll thank me in the morning when you can finally find a pair of matching socks in less than ten minutes, even while still mostly asleep. As you usually are," he added when she opened her mouth to protest, "until about ten in the morning."

"Guilty," she had to acknowledge. "That's why I keep you around."

"To wake you up? Or to sort your socks?"

She grinned. "Both. Among other things. But keep in mind, you spend too much time sorting my socks and underwear and you won't have time to check my work on the fridge. And you know your standards are higher than mine when it comes to de-molding."


	24. Full Circle

_A/N: See, two updates in one year! I swear I really am going to finish this!_

* * *

The next morning found all four detectives looking marginally more well-rested, Goren and Eames more so than Barek and Logan, who, although they had left work well before ten, had not actually fallen asleep until much later.

"So," Eames said through a mouthful of muffin as she strolled past Barek's desk, "you guys didn't actually turn anything up last night, did you? I figured you'd have called if you did."

"Well actually . . ." Barek grinned. "We got a couple of names. But that's as far as we got, and we didn't want to call you guys just for that. Figured you'd be, uh . . . busy."Eames rolled her eyes. "Trust me, you were more than welcome to have distracted me from the sight of Bobby washing and ironing all my socks."

Logan's head popped out from behind the pole. "He _irons _socks?" he asked incredulously.

"Ok, maybe that was a slight exaggeration. But he did wash and fold all of them, which made my evening somewhat less than exciting." Leaning against the edge of Barek's desk, she tried to peer at the other woman's computer monitor. "So . . . what'd you find?"

Barek drew her mouse across the screen, highlighting the text of the two names she and her partner had found the night before. "Andrea Brown and Brian Hoover. Hoover is a wash-out, as far as we can tell. He's confirmed to have not left the West Coast in weeks."

"What about Brown?"

"Haven't researched her yet. We knocked off a couple minutes after we found her name."

Eames's eyebrows went up at that, but she made no comment. "So, have you tried to track her down this morning, then?"

"Well, we've been trying," Logan spoke up, his voice muffled by the pole that once again blocked his face from their view, "but so far we've got a big fat _nada_. There's dozens of Andrea Browns floating around Google, and none of them look particularly promising. The one we're looking for might have something to do with linguistics - that's what the post that linked her to her screen name was about."

"Linguistics," Eames mused. "I . . . hold on!" Suddenly, she abandoned her post on Barek's desk and made a dash for her own, across the room.

Barek and Logan looked at each other. "Wonder what that was about," Logan said thoughtfully, watching as Eames began pawing through her top desk drawer, obviously looking for something.

"Beats me," Barek replied, following his gaze. "Hopefully she finds whatever it is she thought of." And with a sigh, she returned to her so-far-fruitless Google searching.

* * *

"Eames?" Bobby asked, watching his partner tear through her belongings. "Anything I can help with?"

Alex nodded without looking up. "Find me Sara King. I need her number."

He blinked. "Sara King? From -"

"Empire State. Yes," she replied without letting him finish. "We're looking for someone who might be a linguist, and she's the only one I can think of at the moment who might be able to help us out."

He'd question his partner after he fulfilled her request, he decided. He thought for a second, then pulled up a file on his computer that contained his notes from the Andrew Kim murder case that had brought him and Eames together. Skimming the contents, his eyes caught on a phone number. "Here. Got it." He read the number to he, watching as she jotted it down on her desk blotter. "Are you going to call her?"

"Not sure. Is it too early to call a graduate student?" she wondered out loud.

"Nah. It's almost nine. If she's not up, she should be."

"Good enough for me." And she snatched up her phone.

* * *

Sara King was, in fact, awake. She had just finished making coffee in her small kitchen and was about to sit down on her couch to drink it when her cell phone rang. Sighing, she put down the mug of hot caffeine and picked up the phone. "Hello?"

"Sara King, please," said a female voice.

"Speaking." Sara eyed the coffee cup again, transferred her phone to the other ear, and picked up the mug. She took a cautious sip of the hot liquid, then continued, "Who's this?"

"Detective Alex Eames. I'm not sure if you remember me -"

Sara, shaken by the memories the name stirred up, returned the mug to her coffee table and concentrated on the phone. "I remember you. Is it . . . is there something with Drew?" she blurted, wondering why a police detective would be calling her unless it involved her ex-boyfriend, who had murdered a professor at their college.

"No, no," Eames hastened to say. "This is actually about . . . well, I need your professional expertise."

They needed her expertise? Since when did the Major Case squad need not-quite-Phd linguists? Sara was silent for a moment, then said tentatively, "Ok. Go ahead. What do you need?"

"If I run a name by you, of someone who might be in your line of work, do you think you would know - or could find out - if that person is, you know, someone?"

Sara took a moment to disentangle the meaning of that question, then nodded into the phone. "Probably, if it's someone who's a grad student or above. Undergrads would be more difficult."

"We're not sure which, if any, this might be," Eames replied. "All we have is a name."

"Well, shoot." She reached for a pad of paper and a pencil and prepared to jot down any names the detective said.

"Andrea Brown."

The pencil was returned to the table and Sara pushed the pad of paper away in mild surprise. "I don't need to look that one up, even. Andrea Brown was a student here for two years. As far as I know, she dropped out of the masters program last spring."

That was far more than Eames had expected to get from Sara, and for a moment she wasn't sure what question she should ask next. "Do you . . . know her email address?" she finally mustered. "Or her phone number? Or anything we could contact her with?"

"No, sorry. I didn't know her well. But I bet you could get that information with no problem from the department. Maybe contact Dr. Jones?"

"Sure, we can do that. Hey, Sara, thanks. Really, we appreciate this. And . . . I apologize for calling you. You probably figured you were well rid of us after we closed the case."

Sighing, Sara shrugged at no one in particular. "I did, but you guys were good to me. I don't mind helping you now."

She hung up the phone, laid it on the table, and looked thoughtfully into her rapidly-cooling mug of coffee.


End file.
